Math Monday - How do you use math?

Welcome and thank you for stopping by Math Monday, I hope you will consider joining the conversation.

I recently attended the NCTE conference where the same message kept creeping into my sessions.  If you are going to teach reading, you need to be a reader.  If you are going to teach writing, you need to be writing yourself.  If you are going to teach poetry, you need to read poetry.  I bet you can see where I am going with this.  If you are going to teach math, you have to use math.  So, how do you use math?  Are you a math mentor for your students and share how you use math in your life?  When we know there is a purpose and reason for learning, engagement and motivation for learning is higher.

I recently realized I use math a lot when I am running.  When I'm running outside, I start my Runkeeper App and listen to numbers being rattled off to me every five minutes.  I like to know the distance I have ran, my pace, and how long I have been running.  I can then process the distance or time I have ran and figure out how much further I have to go to meet my goal for the day.  I've also found numbers can drive my running.  By listening to my five minute update, I can figure out if my pace is slowing down and try to speed it up a bit if I want a certain goal to happen for the day.  I also celebrate those moments when I've got a bit further than expected.

When I run inside, I find myself processing fractions.  For some reason while running on a treadmill, I break up my 30 minutes into thirds but then I can switch that to halves at 15 minutes and then two thirds is a much happier fraction to think about!  When I want to think about success and what is behind me the fraction of five sixths lets me know the end is in sight.  I also use decimals when I set my pace for the day and know that even a tenth of a number can make a little difference and reduce my time at the end of a run.

This is just a small slice of my life and how I use numbers.  When and how do you use numbers to help you with something in life?  If you are going to teach math, remember to be a math mentor!

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