D & Z Chapters 3&4

Recently we have been discussing the readability and effectiveness of text. I must say that I never took it much into consideration before. In this weeks chapters. D and Z brought up some great points. I personally related to Chapter 3 when D and Z discuss the poor design of textbooks. Textbooks are meant to be an aid in education and unfortunately sometimes something as simple as the design and layout of the text can hinder the users education. Math texts are very unique when it comes to content and design. I have seen and used many different types/publishers of texts and the differences are usually quite obvious. It seems to me that most texts are written to use for 100% of the concept introduction and teaching of that content. I have come across books that I do believe can be used just about every day and can be very beneficial to students but this is not the case with the majority of texts.
I am teaching a Bridge math course, which is a fairly new type of course. Therefore, the books are relatively recently written. Because of this, I believe that the text was rushed to publication and there was not enough time or planning spent in creating the text. I do not actually use the book in my class. I use it mostly as a guide for me to determine which concepts should be taught in what sequence. The students don't seem to mind not having a text. I believe the Tennessee Bridge Math book is one of the most poorly written texts I have read. It covers a wide variety of topics but does not provide many well detailed examples. It is definitely a representation of the ever popular education phrase "a mile wide and an inch deep."
I dont think that all texts are bad and that teachers should disregard their help, but I am gaining much more confidence in my ability to find the usefulness of a text.

Reflection #3

This weeks reading from Daniels and Zemelman was a nice change of pace. Mathematics does not often get recognized when speaking about text books. I really enjoyed that chapter 6 provided many ways to help both teachers and students interpret math texts. This chapter points out that often times, math texts are the most difficult to read and follow. I have a feeling that this just intensifies student's frustrations with mathematics. The typical layout of math texts is very different from what students are used to when they imagine a text book. As do most people, students get very uncomfortable when dealing with unfamiliarity. I believe students often struggle reading math texts because of this lack of comfort. When reading math texts, students will often get stuck in the middle of reading and immediately get frustrated. If they do not give up, then their frustration clouds the rest of the reading. This really bothers me because I believe math texts can be very easy to read if given a far chance. Most math texts give a step-by-step instruction when introducing a concept and/or formula. Also, many times there are side notes that elaborate even more on the step-by-step instruction. I think that teachers can give students directions and suggestions on how to read through math texts at the beginning of the year to help rid some of the future frustration.

Readability

I chose to do a readability calculation on the Tennessee Bridge Math book since that is the book that I kind of, sort of, use in class. I was a bit shocked to see the average readability of the three passages  I chose was only a 6.4. It makes a bit of sense considering the course is a remedial course, but still 6 is a bit low. The first two passages I quoted were only a 5 while the third was a 7.6. I am very curious to see just exactly how readability is calculated. I used the Flesch Method for calculating it by copy and pasting text into Microsoft Word. I would also like to see if the different methods calculate readability differently.

Web Resource: CoolMath.com

The website CoolMath.com is a great resource for teachers, students, and even parents. The site addresses many different levels ranging from prealgebra through calculus. The site was designed for just about anyone. The sites claims to be designed for "math geeks," students just looking to get through a class, and even those that claim to hate math. the creator, Karen, created the site looking to help anybody that seeks help in the math world. It seems that the majority of funding stems from donations and also ad space. There are ads on the sides of just about every page, but there are no pop up ads and the ads take up very little space. Most importantly, the ads do not take away from the functionality of the site. There is a clear link to the donations or ad space information if anyone is interesting in supporting the site.
Upon entering the site, it is quite clear that it is meant to be edgy. There is neon colored font on a black background. This layout and design does not hinder the navigation of the site; as a matter of fact, it seems to enhance it. Everything is clearly labeled and takes you directly where it says it will take you.
At the top of the home page, you will notice tabs that will take you to a spin off of the CoolMath site that take you to special sites for teachers, students, parents, finance, etc. The site seems to be best utilized as a source to help solidify your understanding of a concept (from a student's perspective). It does not necessarily teach a concept, rather than let you explore it. This is mostly done through completely interactive games. However, using the teacher resources, there is access to many lesson plans, activity templates, and many other things that can be used as a teacher in the classroom. The amount of resources for both the teacher and the student is astounding. There are suggestions, examples, and templates for lessons and other resources such as eportfoios or web quests. One of the only drawbacks of using this site is that each student will need access to the internet and a computer in order to use the site properly.
Overall, this seems to be a great resource for anyone experiencing any sort of math from any perspective. The site is very user friendly and easily navigated. I was personally impressed with the amount of resources acquired since its creation in 1997. Check it out!

Developing Lanuage

Hart and Risely

This article focuses mainly on the development of language of children from different economic environments. In particular, it focuses on the experience of words during early childhood. There is a large gap of the number of words children are exposed to by the age of four. Children coming from upper socioeconomic status have experienced up to thirty million more words by the age of four then children living in a welfare family.  It also states that the gap seems to grow as the children get older. This is a good reminder to educators that there a lot of factors that affect a child’s life before schooling even begins and that many of these factors are out of our control. It is important to remember as an educator, that every student is different.  I would have liked to see a little more results regarding the middle classes. It also seems that this study was a bit skewed due to the fact that they were only able to gather info from families that were willing to cooperate. There are many factors that could alter a child’s language development regardless of socioeconomic status.

Since my focus is mathematics, I found myself often wondering just how this study would affect mathematics language development. Most words used in mathematics have a good chance of never being experienced until introduced in a classroom, regardless of socioeconomic status. I am curious to see just how much early childhood language development affects the ability to learn mathematics vocabulary in school.