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At the ATC, one of our goals is to integrate the core subjects with the technical classes. I use the newspaper in my Liberal Arts Math class, which I have subtitled "Reality Math." In lieu of a textbook, we use the Daytona Beach News-Journal and the Internet as our main sources of information.

Throughout the course we work on these units: personal budgeting, buying/owning a vehicle, preparing/buying food, planning a college education, renting/buying a house, investing money, paying taxes, and finding the right career. Each week we search the News-Journal for articles or advertisements related to the current unit of study, or previous units.

For instance, during the food unit, we used the grocery store inserts to do comparison shopping. During the personal budgeting unit, we used the department store ads to find realistic percent problems. During our unit on personal vehicles, we looked at the ads for the area car dealers. We discussed how to interpret such ads when looking for a vehicle to buy. We used the Sunday Real Estate section to find articles on housing. Recently we read "Increased Housing Starts" and discussed how this situation effects the buying/selling of a house. Overall, the Business section is the best source of material for this course. It will be a rich source of material when we are learning about investing in the stock market. We plan to track various stocks while the students participate in a stock simulation activity.

We have a bulletin board in the hallway, titled "Reality Math" (picture attached). There we display some of the many News-Journal articles that relate to our course of study. Some of the articles we have found useful this year include "Two-wheel commute," "Toyota wants Gen Y to try on new Scion," "Paying for college," "Young Entrepreneurs: Right Plan, funds, keys to success," "Don´t ask, don´t tell when it comes to his age," and "High-tech degree not a guarantee for college seniors."

This Liberal Arts Math class is a very exciting course for the students, our community speakers, and me. I want to thank the Daytona Beach News-Journal for helping make this course successful.

Bright Ideas Contest Winner - 2004
Category: 9-12

Peg Fisher
Liberal Arts Math
Advanced Technology Center

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