Generic Tasks

Generic Tasks (IO5)

Math trails are about outdoor mathematics, authentic tasks, physical activity, new technologies and teamwork. And we assert: The combination of these aspects works (almost) everywhere and just like magic, because in every city there are stairs, buildings, parking lots, ramps, signs and many other recurring objects where you can do math actively. These objects offer the chance to easily and quickly transfer existing tasks to other locations. We call these tasks generic tasks. The idea behind is thus a finished question in which only the object is exchanged and the measuring values ​​are collected.

We want to develop generic tasks (blueprints) for tasks one can find everywhere. So it will become much easier to create tasks, because there is range of ideas and best-practise examples. To make this a usable tool, we need to create it like a catalogue with automatic translations via the different languages.

A generic tasks is not to be confused with a task template. Generic tasks can result in a task template, but they do not do so automatically. So they are a preparation for authoring tools within the we portal. But there will propably generic tasks which cannot be converted to task templates.

We see a great innovation in this. So far there is no comparable project, no big internet collection of math trail tasks. This catalogue will be integrated into the web portal, so one can look at the generic tasks, chose one and inside the portal create a local tasks out of it (sometimes with the help of task templates) and build a math trail with this kind of tasks in a short time. Since time is one of main issues for teachers not to use a certain technology, we expect this catalogue to have a heavy impact on the number of created math trails and outdoor tasks. Also the transferability potential is big, the generic tasks can inspire teachers to create local tasks or even textbook tasks for normal lessons.