In my WebQuest on matrix operations and applications I send students on a journey to find resources to learn about matrices on their own and additionally how matrices are used in the 'real world.' This activity allows students to dig into the subject matter for a great conceptual understanding of matrix operations, but also, this activity encourages students to teach themselves.
This WebQuest was designed so that the subject matter (in this case Matrix Operations) could easily be substituted for almost any mathematical topic found in the classroom. Feel free to adapt such a format to your own needs. I would have loved to add my own suggestions on where to look for information, but this would have taken away such discovery from the students and thus undermined one of my goals. (However I did manage to sneak in a Yaymath.org video, I'm a big fan)
Here are a few sites I would hope the students discovered along the way:
http://library.thinkquest.org/20991/alg2/matrices.html - not elaborate, but effective
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFApWAl3NJw&feature=related - Good video for matrix addition/subtraction
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYlOjyPyX3g&feature=related - same person doing multiplication
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKhhYguY0DQ&feature=related - because videos are more interesting
http://www.algebralab.org/lessons/lesson.aspx?file=Algebra_matrices_AddSubtract.xml - simple but effective interactive instruction
These links could be some of the better sites to connect students with the procedural knowledge involved and thus may have helped achieve my objective, but like I mentioned above, one of my goals was to teach students how to research this kind of information for themselves.
Have more ideas for the WebQuest or for more info on teaching matrix operations, please leave a comment, they are appreciated.
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