You might want to look up botball. It will probably be more appropriate for your fifth graders. It gives them a good challenge, and most students were somewhat successful. We do robots that follow lines using a light sensor and sumo robots, but this is in the high school level, rather than K-5. You might try making the basic frame for the robot out of legos and letting them modify it rather than designing the entire robot.
I would suggest the Either the newest Casio model or One of TI-84/89. The Casio does everthing the TI-84 does, and at half the price. It has a menu system that is quick and easy to use. The TI-84 is likely what your teacher will be familiar with, so if you run into trouble, there might be someone to help you. Chances are the TI-89 will be banned on anything but the AP exam or the SAT.
Personally I prefer my HP, but I would not suggest a student buy one.
Background:
I am a Math teacher at a public high school in Silicon Valley. I have taught programming before (C++) but do not at my current job.
I see few kids who are interested in programming. Our programming classes are in danger of being cancelled due to the very low sign ups. Most of our students cannot/will not program their calculators either. I do teach how to do some programming of the calculator as it helps with simulation. My students will go to extremes to avoid this relatively simple task.
That being said, there is a large group of students who are interested in the hardware. We offer two levels of computer repair and system adminstration. These classes are all about recycling old computers for service at the school. Our students were able to successfully build a computer lab as part of the process. I do believe the students also have the option to build a computer for their own use.
So the outlook on programming doesn't look so great, but computers in general (especially hardware) does look good.
At my school (a school near San Jose, CA) my math department will be trying some of what you mention. We currently are ordering all of our textbooks with PDF versions as well as paper (not every student has a computer, even in Silicon Valley). We also have LCD projectors in most of our classrooms. For the students who have the technology at home, we hope that these devices will make a difference. We also hope that by using the LCD projector we can capture our notes (we use a stylus to write) and distibute them electronically to students.
While technology will make some difference, and improve some of the education, it does has to be balanced with a more traditional approach. While it would be nice to teach math from a more analytical/creative point of view, we MUST follow the standards created by the state of California. The tests for these standards are very traditional (solve x^2+2x-1=0, for example) with no calculator allowed. If I fail to teach my students how to solve these BY HAND, I will lose my job, regardless of how well my students may know the more interesting parts to quadratics.
Unless the laws are changed (unlikely) the technology is almost useless. The best use of technology has been the graphing calculator in Alebra II and higher courses. Mathematica is nice for Calculus, and SPSS would be wonderful for Statistics, but ultimately our students will be assessed without the technology.
At my school, we have a computer club that enters into the botball competition. We get a small scholarship from NASA to compete and the PTSA usually covers the rest. While it is not fighting robots, it does involve two or more robots on some sort of arena.
Most of what keeps our students going to the competion is the fact that they can play counterstrike and work on robots. I suspect the results would be different if we took out counterstrike...
Eighteen quintillion, four hundred forty five quadrillion, six hundred eighteen trillion, one hundred ninety nine billion, five hundred seventy two million, two hundred fifty thousand, six hundred and twenty five.
I will have to remember this number when I teach combinations to my Algebra II students in three weeks!
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You might want to look up botball. It will probably be more appropriate for your fifth graders. It gives them a good challenge, and most students were somewhat successful. We do robots that follow lines using a light sensor and sumo robots, but this is in the high school level, rather than K-5. You might try making the basic frame for the robot out of legos and letting them modify it rather than designing the entire robot.
While I don't personally use your distribution I want to thank you for making it available.
Your hard work IS appreciated.
I would suggest the Either the newest Casio model or One of TI-84/89. The Casio does everthing the TI-84 does, and at half the price. It has a menu system that is quick and easy to use. The TI-84 is likely what your teacher will be familiar with, so if you run into trouble, there might be someone to help you. Chances are the TI-89 will be banned on anything but the AP exam or the SAT. Personally I prefer my HP, but I would not suggest a student buy one.
Background: I am a Math teacher at a public high school in Silicon Valley. I have taught programming before (C++) but do not at my current job. I see few kids who are interested in programming. Our programming classes are in danger of being cancelled due to the very low sign ups. Most of our students cannot/will not program their calculators either. I do teach how to do some programming of the calculator as it helps with simulation. My students will go to extremes to avoid this relatively simple task. That being said, there is a large group of students who are interested in the hardware. We offer two levels of computer repair and system adminstration. These classes are all about recycling old computers for service at the school. Our students were able to successfully build a computer lab as part of the process. I do believe the students also have the option to build a computer for their own use. So the outlook on programming doesn't look so great, but computers in general (especially hardware) does look good.
At my school (a school near San Jose, CA) my math department will be trying some of what you mention. We currently are ordering all of our textbooks with PDF versions as well as paper (not every student has a computer, even in Silicon Valley). We also have LCD projectors in most of our classrooms. For the students who have the technology at home, we hope that these devices will make a difference. We also hope that by using the LCD projector we can capture our notes (we use a stylus to write) and distibute them electronically to students. While technology will make some difference, and improve some of the education, it does has to be balanced with a more traditional approach. While it would be nice to teach math from a more analytical/creative point of view, we MUST follow the standards created by the state of California. The tests for these standards are very traditional (solve x^2+2x-1=0, for example) with no calculator allowed. If I fail to teach my students how to solve these BY HAND, I will lose my job, regardless of how well my students may know the more interesting parts to quadratics. Unless the laws are changed (unlikely) the technology is almost useless. The best use of technology has been the graphing calculator in Alebra II and higher courses. Mathematica is nice for Calculus, and SPSS would be wonderful for Statistics, but ultimately our students will be assessed without the technology.
At my school, we have a computer club that enters into the botball competition. We get a small scholarship from NASA to compete and the PTSA usually covers the rest. While it is not fighting robots, it does involve two or more robots on some sort of arena. Most of what keeps our students going to the competion is the fact that they can play counterstrike and work on robots. I suspect the results would be different if we took out counterstrike...
Eighteen quintillion, four hundred forty five quadrillion, six hundred eighteen trillion, one hundred ninety nine billion, five hundred seventy two million, two hundred fifty thousand, six hundred and twenty five.
I will have to remember this number when I teach combinations to my Algebra II students in three weeks!