Technology and Math Do Not Always Mix

Hello everyone out there! :) My name is Hayley Studebaker and I am a sophomore at Cedarville University. I am originally from New Carlisle, Ohio which is just north of Dayton. I enjoy spending time with friends, attending Young Life, playing intramural soccer, and cheering on the all-girl squad here at school. I graduated from Tecumseh High School in 2010 with Honors and as Valedictorian.  I am studying Math Education in hopes of one day being a high school math teacher. Going from a high school student to a college student, I experienced a lot of differences in teaching techniques.  One of the most obvious is the impact that technology has had in the classroom, professors and students.  Technology has grown in importance to the point that it is impossible to avoid it.  So for all you anti-techies out there, it is time to dive into the world of technology that continues to grow around us. In the classroom is one of the most obvious ways that technology has changed.  The days of chalk boards was replaced by white boards, projectors, and smart boards.  Technology has even gotten to the point where you do not have to attend class, but solely have to log onto the Internet.  As a future high school math teacher, technology will be knocking at my classroom door. I think technology is an important tool for teachers to use, but there are certain techniques that do not involve the newest technology that I feel work better for math classes.  Math lessons are best learned when written out on a board and if the students copy the notes down in a notebook.  The real magic happens when the thought goes down your arm and onto your paper.  The only thing about writing the notes on the board is it can be very repetitive for the teacher if they teach multiple class periods of the same subject.  A Smart Board is an excellent resource of technology for a math teacher to use.  It makes it possible to write on like a white board, but it is connected to a computer so you can save the writing if desired. This cuts down on the repetitiveness of rewriting the notes every time on the board, but gives the same environment of the students writing the notes.  Some may think that using PowerPoint would be as affective. However, math is much easier to write than type.  I think that technology has advanced in a very positive way, but for a high school math classroom sometimes the newest forms of technology are not the best.