PhotoStory - Homework in the Math Classroom

This Photostory is from my Action Research Project this past spring. The original project was a PowerPoint and it had a more dry and technical approach; it was full of statistics, research and literature reviews. With Photostory I created a "movie" version of the PowerPoint, added some things, and then deleted all of the statistics and research to make the movie less clinical. I hope you enjoy it. I liked creating the Photostory; I found it easy to use and upload. I did notice that I have some feedback on my microphone on the few slides that I narrated. I probably should have bought or borrowed a plug in microphone instead of relying on the microphone in my laptop. As for my students I believe they would have fun with this type of presentation as opposed to PowerPoint. Any assignment that could be created with PowerPoint could easily be transferred to this format. In my classroom I would probably give my students the option of using either one.

Financial Math Power Pt

View more presentations from Debbie Doshier.

PowerPoint & Google Presentation

My Google Docs PowerPoint presentation covers a topic I cover every year in my Conceptual Math classes - the Pros and Cons of Credit Cards. I spent a good deal of time just playing with the program; figuring out how to import images and format the slide backgrounds. After completing the presentation I saved the PowerPoint as a Google Doc so it could be uploaded to my blog page.(I did this before I realized that the next assignment was a Google Docs Upload). I noticed that I lost the slide transitions and the sound effects in this process. I found this VERY discouraging, considering the amount of time I spent creating the original PowerPoint. I then used Slide Share to upload the presentation, and that is the one you see above. I still lost the slide transitions and the sound effects, however, it still copied better than the Google Docs. I have used pre-made PowerPoints in my classes, and I have had my students use PowerPoint presentations on certain projects. After completing this PowerPoint I feel much more comfortable with the program. The presentation I created for this assignment will be the first self-made PowerPoint I will use in my classes, though I will use the original PowerPoint and NOT the one I saved to my blog. Also, I am concerned about the length of the PowerPoint. The number slides required for this assignment seems excessive. If I take time to engage in a class discussion with each slide, this presentation will take days!

Jackson Pollock

What a challenge this was for someone as artistically challenged as me. The site gives you no warning and no directions, at least none that I could find. The first time you move your mouse an explosion of orange follows it. I finally figured out how to click and clear the screen and finally maneuvered the mouse into a corner. It also seems that the speed at which you move the mouse affects the thickness of the line. Just play and have some fun. I decided to use this site to create a logo for DoshierMath. Can you see the D and the M? I used the Screen Print to capture the image and then added some color and text using Paint. I am hard pressed to find a math connection for this site, however, it would be a fun place for my students to go and play. I would be curious to see what some of my more artistic students could do with this site.

Self Portrait

This Self Portrait was created using the Mr.PicassoHead website. This was an exercise in creativity, something which is not my strong point. However, since the Picasso style is abstract in the extreme, I found it easy to "express" my inner self. I've always wanted to be a redhead with green eyes, so thanks to Picasso I am. Creating the image was easy, but I would recommend visiting the gallery first to get some ideas of what is possible. After completing the portrait I saved it to the gallery and then entered my email so a link could be sent to me. At this time the link has not been sent, instead I kept receiving a server error message. To circumvent this problem I created a link to my portrait after searching the gallery for my image. If the server error is corrected I can fix the link later. I sometimes have my students do biographies of mathematicians, and I could see them using this site to create a portrait to accompany the their work.

PhotoShop

This is the link to a photo that I edited using PhotoShop. This is a single photo of my daughters at Disneyland. I also created a small photo album of some special events from the past few years. The picture at the right is one of the photos in the album before I did any editing/decorating. This was one of the "fun" assignments and I could see myself using the PhotoShop website for both personal and professional reasons. Though it was nice to be able to edit photos to improve their quality, I actually enjoyed the decorate feature the most. I believe my students would have fun with this site as well. I could see using the site in a geometry class to edit photos of geometric examples in architecture.

Web Album

This album is a collection of photos from our family's trip back to Oklahoma to visit my husband's family. And yes, the rattlesnake is real and was killed in the front yard, the alligator is not real. I downloaded the Picassa3 software through my Google account, and found the process so easy that I created a second album of my girls in their sports activities. After downloading the software Picassa3 searched my computers for photos that already existed and imported them for me. It was then just an easy click to create a new album and drag and drop photos into the album. One more click and the album was synced to the web, a URL was created and then I hyperlinked this URL in my blog. Easy!

On-Line Graphics Part 2

In the second part of this assignment I used the data from NAEP to create two more charts using Excel. This time I used the 8th grade math scores and I used two different scales to illustrate how data can be manipulated, depending on what you want the data "to say". Continued...

On-line Graphics

As a concerned member of the statewide assessment team I have created a chart to illustrate the ranking of West Virginia students compared to the rest of the nation. The information in this chart was collected from the National Assessment of Educational Progress website. I am concerned that if West Virginia's students continue to lag behind the nation in their progress. Continued.....

Crappy Graphics

Finally an assignment I could complete in less than an hour! Crappy Graphics was a fun (if naughty) little site that was extremely easy to use and navigate. Click here to view a larger version of my line graph and to link to the Crappy Graphics website.

Image Capture - Screen Print

I used the Paint application to crop and resize images that I had captured using the Print Screen function on my computer. Click here to see the images. After capturing the images with Print Screen I opened the Paint program and pasted in the images. Click here to read the entire entry...

Desktop Graphic

My desktop graphic is a Hierarchy of the Real Numbers that was created using Word97. Click here to see the graphic. I chose to use Word97 and its SmartArt feature because it is a program that is readily accessable on most computers, and as it turns out SmartArt was extremely user friendly. Click here to read more....