6B- _____ Vocabulary: Sample Vocab in the News: Article & Summary

Name: ______Date: ______

6B- _____ Vocabulary: Sample Vocab in the News: Article & Summary

“Math Madness…”

Directions: Use these samples to help you complete this assignment.

http://www.timeforkids.com/node/33301/print

Math Madness

TFK Kid Reporter Claire Duncan visits theMathAlive!exhibit in Washington, D.C.

MAR 19, 2012|By TFK Kid Reporter Claire Duncan

COURTESY DUNCAN FAMILY

RAYTHEON COMPANY

Students learn about angles as they play the snowboard game.

“Why do we need to learn all this math anyway?” Does this sound familiar? Kids around the world have been asking this question for years. Finally, a new exhibit calledMathAlive!is answering back. The exhibit features 47 different hands-on activities designed to teach kids how math is used in everyday life.

The Raytheon Company created the exhibit as part of theirMathMovesUprogram. The exhibit will visit 15 U.S. and International cities in the next 5 years. TFK Kid Reporter Claire Duncan saw it at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington D.C. The company hopes having a movable exhibit will allow more kids to participate and learn the relevance of math.

“We’ve learned so much about student attitudes toward math,” says Pam Wickham, who works for Raytheon. “We want to make sure that as many kids as possible have an opportunity to visit.”

How We Measure Up

RAYTHEON COMPANY

A student learns about frequency as he creates his own animation.

According to the Programme for International Student Assessment, students in the U.S. rank 31st in the world in math performance. Before creating the exhibit, Raytheon Company decided to conduct their own study to understand more about U.S. students’ attitudes toward math. They asked 1,000 U.S. middle school students ages 10-14 to rank the importance of math and their feelings toward the subject.

·  70 percent of respondents said they like math

·  15 percent chose Math as their favorite subject. (Third to Physical Education and Art)

·  58 percent believe math will be important to their future

·  85 percent of students could identify Lady Gaga, while only 66% were able to identify Albert Einstein

·  44 percent would rather take out the trash than do math homework.

But most students could agree on a preference for hands-on, interactive activities or computer-based lessons instead of more traditional approaches, such as textbooks.

It’s Alive

You won’t find any textbooks at theMathAlive!exhibit. Most of the stations are interactive. At the Measure Up station, visitors test the theory that a person’s arm span equals their height. At the snowboard race station, only the perfect angles will win the race down the snow-covered hill.

Math skills will also help visitors virtually control the NASA robot on a mission outside of the Space Station. Designing is also a big part of the experience. Visitors can design and build bridges, create a custom skateboard or develop their own video games.

Alex Vogel of Arlington, Virginia, visited the exhibit with his family. “I never knew math could be seen in such a fun way,” he said.

To learn more aboutMathAlive!,visit www.mathmovesu.com or www.mathalive.com.

In the March 19, 2012 edition of Time for Kids, in her article entitled “Math Madness,” kid reporter Claire Duncan discusses her visit to The Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC., where she explores the MathAlive! exhibit. The Raytheon Company started the exhibit, which attempts to help people understand how math is relevant in their lives. Unfortunately, one of the reasons Raytheon made the exhibit is they know that many young people, ages ten to fourteen, report liking math, but they have also expressed a disconnect with the subject, even earning lower scores than their foreign counterparts in this area of their learning. Disappointed by students’ mixed reactions and relatively poor test scores, Raytheon provides them with hands-on, interactive math activities that make the subject feel fun for young people. In fact, the article ends with another visitor’s enthusiastic endorsement of the exhibit, suggesting that Raytheon has achieved its goal. Essentially, Duncan’s visit to the MathAlive! exhibit illustrates that our response to our education might be, in some cases, directly related to our perception of its relevance in our lives.

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