5 MORE Ways to Use Equatio

(27th June 2017) - Emily Fitzpatrick, Director of Professional Development, EdTechTeam Canada

Originally posted on the EdTechTeam blog.

Have you heard?! Equatio, by Texthelp, now works in all of your favorite Google Workspace for Education Tools: Docs, Forms, Sheets, Slides and Drawings! Back in April 2017, we shared with you five ways to get started using Equatio in your classroom and we are back with five more.

Here are 5 MORE ways to use Equatio in your classroom:

1. Show Your Thinking in Slides

No matter where you teach, students are always asked to show their thinking when solving problems. Previously, teachers would ask students to write out their thinking in sentences. Now, students have the power of a chromebook at their fingertips!

Get your students to build you a walk through of their solution using Equatio and Slides. Once the steps are laid out, have the students use an app like Screencastify to record their own verbal explanation/justification of the solution. Save the video to YouTube or Google Drive and hand it in using Google Classroom.

OR add these videos to their digital portfolio - a great resource bank for the students to use in future math and science classes!

Here is a slide deck with questions and corresponding solution slides to get you started.

2. Different Perspectives in Slides

Asking a question to the class often reveals one or two students’ hands with one or two unique ideas following. Instead of individuals sharing their answers (and the rest of the class agreeing with them), students can now have their own slide in a collaborative slide deck and use Equatio to create their unique solution.

Within the collaborative Google Slide deck, students have access to the Internet for diagrams, images, and inspiration. Equatio allows students to use common language and pre-populated equations to move beyond computation.

Here is an example of a slide deck with the template I use. Always remember to allot time at the end of the lesson for Q&A and to provide feedback to each other’s solutions.

*Pro Tip: Assign each student a number at the start of the year. This is their Slide number for each collaborative slide deck they use.

3. Data Management in Sheets

Collecting data from real-life situations and graphing the data to predict information is a common practice in solving problems in science and mathematics. Using Equatio, students can write the equation of their regression, in proper mathematical format, and use the equation to predict future information about the trend.

4. Balancing Chemical Equations

Utilize the prediction tools in Equatio and the flexibility of Google Slides or Drawings to easily practice balancing chemical equations. Google Slides and Drawings allows the students to easily move equations to where they want them on the screen! Incorporating shapes and callouts helps the student justify or add additional dialogue to their work.

Make sure to turn on Chemistry Prediction in Equatio’s options!

5. Math Manipulatives in Drawings

Many of our physical math manipulatives can be made into digital math manipulatives using Google Drawings. Combined with the power of Equatio, students can now use the tool that works best to solve the problem and show their work all digitally.

Algebra Tiles are a great way of physically representing an algebraic expression whether you are going to factor or expand it. Here is a template algebra tile workspace. Use Equatio to add in the equation or have the students create one themselves!

BONUS

Predictive Text helps students use the tool the way that works best for them by using their own language rather than predetermined terminology. Equatio has been updated with some new predictive text to help you and your students move beyond computation:

1. Scientific Notation