Math In Action

During my trip to Washington D.C. I met quite a few educators with some amazing video projects that all got off the ground with the help of their local cable company. When I returned home I had an itch to create some videos to use in the classroom that served to answer the question that I've heard more times than any other question in 11 years of teaching...say it with me now..."When are we ever gonna use this stuff?"

I've seen other attempts at answering this question, but in my opinion most of them suffered from a few faults that kept me from ever showing them to my students: they're too long, sometimes unrealistic in their application to my classes and they never get the students involved in any actual mathematical work.

With the help of Bright House Networks I've been working on a project that I hope fills a void left by some other similar videos. We started filming this series, "Math In Action", back in July of 2009 and are finished with 7 episodes with plans to continue shooting this summer at Edwards Air Force Base and some other great locations here in Bakersfield and in Los Angeles.

The videos are kept under 10 minutes so that they are accessible via Youtube and can be a conversation piece without monopolizing all of your precious instructional minutes. Each segment features actual math problems from each career featured so that students can work on the problems along with the video.

Keep in mind that these videos are created mainly as a cable television program. It's really up to the teacher to present these in such a way that accompanies your lesson. Please get involved and don't just press play. PLEASE!

With each video post I will include the Youtube link, download link, and also a sample lesson plan. You can use these in your classrooms in any way you like as long as you don't reproduce any of these as your own work.

Let me know what you think of the videos. All constructive criticism is welcome. Enjoy!