One of the major goals of the GLOBE Program is to enhance student achievement in math. Teachers are reporting that GLOBE can help demonstrate mathematical concepts in a way that makes learning math fun and, best of all, easier to understand.

"Math is a worry for a lot of students," says Jeanette Stopher, a GLOBE Teacher at Corbin High School in Kentucky. "We try to show students a continuity between math and science, that math is not just memorization."

Ms. Stopher teaches ninth grade science and works with the school's math teacher to coordinate the mathematical applications addressed by GLOBE into the math curriculum. The teachers have worked together on algebra, geometry, dimensional analysis, measurement skills, and standard equations. Ms. Stopher says such coordination doesn't have to be a lot of extra work for either teacher. "Our math teacher is very innovative, and she wants something from real life that helps students understand. Getting things together can really mean a five-minute conversation in the hallway," she says.

Using GLOBE to teach math is also useful for younger grades. At the University of Montana in Missoula, Georgia Cobbs works with K-thru-8 pre-service teachers to help them see the links GLOBE offers between science and math. "There's no GLOBE without mathematics," Dr. Cobbs says. "There is a great connection between the math and science methods, and I definitely see GLOBE as a great math foundation."

In Pennsylvania, GLOBE Teacher Gayle Sellers is using GLOBE to help students at Royersford Elementary School understand fractions using decimals and percentages. "In pH, when they decide if it's a 4 or a 5, they use the meter and can see it's a 4.6. Now they understand," Ms. Sellers says.

Nora Ziegler, who teaches students at Hillsdale Elementary School in West Chester, PA, agrees that GLOBE has enabled her students to grasp more advanced math ideas than they otherwise might. Her third-graders are working with percentages, fractions, minimum and maximum temperatures, Fahrenheit to Celsius conversion and some work with spreadsheets. "With GLOBE they can see the math, such as when I demonstrate the cloud cover using strips of blue and white paper. If there are five strips of white and five of blue, they see that it is 50 percent," Ms. Ziegler says.

At the middle school level, GLOBE is also being used to teach percentages, averages, and probabilities. "With the statistics involved in GLOBE, with the information gathering, students are able to use what they've observed in math," says GLOBE Teacher Thomas Ingram from the A.M. Thomas Middle School in Lost Hills, CA.

"We're always looking for things that will take us away from the text book," reports GLOBE Teacher Steve Newman from the Kent Denver School in Englewood, CO. He has used GLOBE to work on averages, mean, median and mode, graphing and other math activities. "It's good when kids have some ownership in the data," Mr. Newman says. "It has also charged up the math people here. GLOBE has a lot of opportunities to do that, using the data and using technology."
 
 

IN THIS ISSUE
GLOBE Fall 1999 Newsletter Index
GLOBE Students	International Update
Science Update	Urban Implementation
U.S. Partner Update	Watershed Studies
Math Lessons	GLOBE Community