I sucked at math with and without a calculator. Equal opportunity math hater. Oddly enough, I teach it well.
Nate is his father with math, in that he can get the right answer, he just sees no use in showing how he got to the right answer and gets incredibly frustrated having to show his work. Abby is completely analytical and math comes super naturally to her, especially the whacked out abstract stuff. Coupled with her love or art and her ability to see things with depth and perception makes me think if she's at all interested, she could do well in architecture.
I hate to interrupt this discussion, but I'm being egotistical and in the likes-carrots mode: God DAMN we're pretty.
t edit
Yeah, I know I need a haircut.
You can ALWAYS interrupt for that kind of gawjus!
I fully admit there was Photoshopping. My face was all sweaty, and so I airbrushed it away. I darkened and blurred the background, but The Boy is fully un-Photoshopped. (Yes, those are his real eyes, no color contacts, no Photoshopping.)
Bwah, the expressions in that shot are priceless.
Aren't they? I giggled like a loon when I uploaded the pic.
(Yes, those are his real eyes, no color contacts, no Photoshopping.)
Oh, I totally remember his eyes just absolutely leaping out even in the dark ambiance of Porkopolis.
Yeah, those eyes are pretty damn pretty and I'm not just talking about his. You guys make a really pretty couple!
always interrupt with the pretty -- it makes us happy
You can ALWAYS interrupt for that kind of gawjus!
Steph, like Barb said, you guys are 'gawjus'!
I got really pissed off when my daughter's sixth grade math class insisted on everyone having a calculator for class. BS. If a student doesn't know how to do the math without using a calculator you're not doing them any favors.
I think that calculators, when used properly, can be a great teaching tool. There are lots of things that can take forever to do without a calculator, and the point gets lost in the details, while it can be made really clear if you do it with a calculator. Most of the examples I can think of are for middle school and higher math, but that's mostly because that's the level that I've taught most.
I especially like graphing calculators for being able to play with functions. They make it so much easier to do things like show the relationship between the roots of an equation and the zeros of a graph, or how the graph of a function and the graph of its derivative relate.
