Use Angry Birds to Teach Math

§ September 7th, 2011 § 7 Comments- Add yours§ Filed under Teaching Math § Tagged Angry Birds, CRA Model, David Wees, Dennis Glasgow, Elevated Math, iPad, Jerome Bruner, Make Mathematics Fun, Mario, Maryscott Glasgow, Mickey Mouse, parabola, quadratic equations, quadratic relations, The MIT Entrepreneurship Review

As David Wees shares in his blog entitled, Make Mathematics Fun, “too many students spend a lot of time not enjoying themselves when learning mathematics.”  He challenges mathematics educators to make math accessible and more easily learned for their students.  Being up for the challenge, here is a suggestion.

Angry Birds is the largest mobile app success the world has seen so far. It is an interactive, animated projectile launcher that creates parabolic motion. The parabola is traced by the flight of the projectile (the bird).  In the app players use a slingshot to launch birds at pigs stationed on or within various structures.  The goal is to destroy all the pigs on the screen. The game is such a huge hit that The MIT Entrepreneurship Review predicts that the game will be bigger than either Mickey Mouse or Mario.  If  kids are that into it,  let’s change it from a mindless game to a vehicle for learning math.

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