Hi, I'm a math teacher in Florence, Italy, Middle School.
For the first time I've been using Sketchup with 13-year-old students
to introduce and work with solids.
We worked 5 weeks (1 our a week with sketchup) and a the end produced
this video which I find interesting:
Students made all the models with Sketchup,
I made the animation (with Sketchup).
[Unfortunately I will no longer work in that school so I cannot carry
on the work with that class]
I think Sketchup may be used with great results for teaching solids,
volumes, sections and the like.
I would totally agree! Yesterday was my first chance to bring an entire class into the lab to complete a Prisms webquest and use sketch up. I believe that there is a much better understanding about prisms and their bases through the use of sketch up. It was amazing how quickly students were creating elaborate composite shapes with very little direction from me. A bunch were planning on going home and installing the program on their own computers. Not sure when I saw this much excitement in class! (It definitely helped that they all were getting to use the program, not just watching me or another student demonstrating).
Thanks Michelle for your comment.
Sorry, I'm not sure I did actually understood the meaning of it (my english is not perfect).
I had to face the excitement of students too, but eventually they calmed down and learnt to enjoy without getting too excited.
I think it is important the fact that they think about using it at home and the fact that learning becomes with sketchup somewhat social.
Moreover I think it is important that, by drawing in 3D, they concentrate on the process and the structure, rather than on the product. (the meaning and not the formula).
I noticed that my previous link was wrong, hope this time it'll work: my second video.
I agree, SketchUp is a great learning application for students. I had 8th graders make models of our school's buildings last year. A couple are in Google Earth's 3D layer and I'm trouble-shooting a few more models. I'm learning too with it.
I have a couple of SketchUp lessons for Middle School math students on my website RealWorldMath.org. Here is one of the lessons. I'm always trying to think of more.
Thank's for your comment
and thank you very much for your links. It would be great if we could gather many SketchUp lessons for Middle School math students. Unfortunately mine are in italian, I think I'm gonna translate them but not anytime soon.