Student Marisela Aguirre (left) moves toward the motion detector while watching her pattern appear on the television screen, as instructor Shay Cardell cheers her on.

Modern Math

From the San Manuel Miner and Copper Basin News

By Mary Myers

Everything’s up to date in the Math Department at CAC. Shay Cardell, head of the Aravaipa Math Department teaches a full range of math classes from pre-algebra through college algebra using the Modern Math approach. Not to be confused with the “new math” that came and went some years ago, Modern Math stresses learning where the students participate actively in cooperative groups, often constructing models in order to understand the concepts. The result is that learners experience real-world applications for math and develop good common sense about numbers.

“SeveraI studies have shown that if you teach the concepts first, then the students understand the rules better,” says Cardell. In the traditional approach, math teachers teach the rules and then conduct drills where math problems are worked out. “The rules put blinders on people. It makes them afraid to think for themselves,” is how Cardell explains the research.

In her Introductory Algebra class this week students figured out how to chart time and motion algebraically by using a motion detector rigged to project its readings onto a television screen. Already on the screen was a jagged graph line. The students attempted to match the graph line by walking back and forth, slowly or quickly in front of the detector, as it recorded their movements and pauses on the screen. Then they wrote equations that described their movements.

According to student Gary Reyes, “What Shay Cardell is, is a translator, putting math into real words.” Missy La Mirand adds that “Most math teachers could never explain to me why I needed math. Now I can calculate my gas mileage.”

Modern Math classes such as those taught at CAC/Aravaipa are based on the Arizona State Department of Education and National Council of Teachers of Mathematics Standards, and prepare our students for the math classes that are taught at Northern Arizona University and the University of Arizona.