With the end of student teaching rapidly approaching, I began my final chapter I will be teaching in my Geometry classes. This chapter is centered on polyhedrons, or three dimensional shapes. In this chapter we will focus on surface area and volumes of different polyhedrons and how to arrive at the several different formulas. I have found that many of my students have trouble forming the three dimensional objects in their mind or drawing them on their paper. I have been gifted with the ability to be able to draw many of the objects with ease, mostly because of my mom who is an art teacher at a local elementary school in our town. I have grown up drawing and increasing my drawing ability with the help of my mom.
This chapter presents a unique opportunity to incorporate my drawing ability and also technology to help students be able to visually see what these objects look like. I have been able to use a free program called Google SketchUp. Google SketchUp allows me to draw three-dimensional solids and rotate, zoom-in, zoom-out, create a cross section, label, measure, and manipulate three-dimensional objects. This helps students become engaged in the lesson and gives them an opportunity to see a model of the polyhedron. Google SketchUp offers a vast number of different tools that I have found useful to use during this chapter.
No comments:
Post a Comment