Gamifying the Unit Circle

Introduction

Precalculus students must be able to evaluate trig functions quickly and easily in order for them to be able to handle later trig topics better. To assist students in that respect, throughout the years I have made sure that students compete in groups against one another in a game called UC Bowl. Below is a description of the game and how it is managed in class.

The Details!

• The class was broken onto three competing teams.
• Each team was allowed to have an ID sheet along with a UC chart.
• Everything else including calculators had to be stashed away.
• And each team was given a small whiteboard to write down final answers to shouted out problems.
• Each rounds will involve a different team member acting as the scribe who would write the answer and quickly raise the board when prompted by me.
• I am standing in the from of the room with a TI calculator and a rubber-head hammer as a gavel.
• The TI calculator runs a Trig UC program written by a former colleague of mine (Thank you Eric Kamichke.) The calculator draws random Trig or Inverse Trig questions for students to answer as quickly as I allow for time-wise in any given round.
• I hit announce the problem to be solved, hit the rubber hammer, the students begin solving the problem, I give a warning to write final answer, and then I hit the hammer once again to have the scribe raise the boar immediately.
• Delays in raising the board results in a zero earned by the group and a word answers leads to a zero as well. Right answers are awarded one point each.
• The scores are tabulated to keep track of the scores.
• Between rounds pauses are taken to allow group members to reflect and discuss amongst themselves.
• The winning group earns sweets and cool treats that vary from year to year.
• Below is a sample of images showing some of the items listed in the above bullets.

Table Set Up for a Group in UC Bowl

Another Group's Table Set Up for UC Bowl

More Table Set Up for a Group in UC Bowl

Scoreboard for UC Bowl after some additional rounds!

Final Scoreboard for UC Bowl after the last few rounds were played!

Closing Remarks!

• The engagements was wonderful by all teams.
• The competition was fierce and even one team emerged as the wild posse team. The members dancing whenever they score points.
• The team that came last had a good comeback in the second class day that the UC Bowl was conducted and they still have chances to redeem themselves.
• The importance of UC and knowing values of trig and inverse trig functions began to sink in as an important part of learning trigonometry.
• In later edition of the game, the trig ID sheets with its UC chart will be removed to allow students to do everything in their heads.

Final Note: Please, use the comments area to share your thoughts on this activity and what kind of games you engage your students in math to make their learning fun and competitive in a healthy way. Thank you

Sinusoid Lab Activities

Nothing helps students get a good handle on mathematical concepts than lab activities that addresses the subtleties and true meaning of the underlying components that accompany such concepts.

Following is a description of a set of lab activities that deal with the sinusoid and its usefulness in trig and in many real life situations that are periodic in nature. 

Day 1: Students were handed a plot, that I obtained in an experiment I conducted as a test run (see still image of video shown below), to model it themselves using the sinusoid (transformed basic sine function) involving the h & k form. First the students had to work alone, then with a partner, and then in a group to assist one another with the modeling process.

Test Run by Mr. Le Nadj! of the Lab the students are about to conduct themselves!

Day 2: Students were handed a data set to enter the first two columns in their respective TI calculators and as a class we worked together to plot the data, model them ourselves as a class, and then the class was broken into three groups whose assignment was to carry out the same process but for columns one and three, one and four, and one and five respectively. The rest of the work consisted of students competing for the best fit equation generated by hand and the group member with the equation that fit the best than her/his group peers will be treated to delicious sweets. No TI sine regression was allowed.

Day 3: Students's regression equations were pitted against one another for each group and the best fit equations were identified and the equations owners were treated to double sweets while the rest of the folks (who did attempt a decent fit of some sort) got single sweets. Afterwards, the sine regression functionality in the TI calculator was introduced and now the students were ready to carry out the lab activities themselves. The setups, the procedures, and all technology matters were introduced. Following, are the pictures of the various setups.

First Setup: The pendulum is facing the motion detector that is resting on a make-shift bubble gum box. The students in this group will alternate in collecting data onto their respective laptops. From the camera perspective, another group is going to use LoggerPro's video capture of the same motions of the pendulum (see picture below.)

Second Setup: The pendulum motion is recorded laterally by the members of another group using LoggerPro's video capture of the same motions of the pendulum that the first group is recording. The idea here is to allow for cross referencing and checking of the various group members' data and results.

Third Setup: An iPad is hanging as a bob from a spring that is attached to a force probe. The oscillatory motion is recorded in two ways, the acceleration of the iPad using SPARKvue app from within the iPad itself (see next pictures) and force using Vernier's dual force probe whose results are fed directly to LoggerPro of the students' laptops. Once again the idea here is to allow for cross referencing and checking of the various group members' data and results using two different means of gathering data related to the same motion.

Day 4: Students did the actual lab; the scene was lively, the graphs were gems (an example is shown below), and the thinking and enthusiasm were Coolism! 

The graph of the oscillatory motion of the iPad shows three parts, the hand picking the iPad to start the recording of the motion, the oscillation, and final the hand picking the iPad again to stop recording the motion.

Once the data collection process was completed and every student obtained her/his data and graphs on their respective laptops, the task of switching LoggerPro's form to theform. This part ended up being the homework that was due next day; every student had to complete the form change and make the predictions requested in parts B, C, & D listed in the lab sheet (shown at the end of this post).

Day 5: Students showed their form changes and their predictions, compared their respective constants, and then discussed their predictions and how they would be checked empirically.

As a whole the activity was not just fun but also led to many insights. The experiment is still in progress in that a followup lab that will make the oscillations dampened shall ensue when exponential functions come into the picture.

Thank you for reading the post and please provide some feedback, suggestions, or variations you deem worth consideration. 

Thank you and take great care! :-) 

Hand Outs: