STEM Calculator Guides for TI-Nspire and TI-84

[Nevil Hopley]

Hello

This posting includes a wee bit of background to a TI-Nspire 'STEM' guide that you may like to use in your school (link to download it is given below)

In our school, some of our maths sets have students who all own Nspires and other sets all own TI84's.

When they go to Technology or Science lessons, they are no longer in their maths sets and thus the Tech & Science teachers have a 'mixed-technology' class.

Currently, it's unreasonable for those subjects' teachers to be au fait with how to get all the models of calculators owned by their students to do the sort of things that they need the students to be able to do in their subject (ie Scientific Notation, Engineering mode, Binary to Decimal conversion, etc, etc)

Hence, with a lot of trialing of drafts and consultation with several teachers and an experienced editor, I present to you the following STEM guides. They are designed to be provided to students and have available in Science, Technology and Maths classrooms for quick reference to help with making straightforward calculations happen!

The TI-Nspire STEM guide can be found on the UK TI-Nspire resource website 'nspiringlearning.com'.

A direct link is here:

http://resource.nspiringlearning.org.uk/classroomresources/activities/activity.jsp?id=369

(The Press-to-Test settings are as decreed by the International Baccalaureate arrangements documents)

The TI-84 STEM guide is attached to this posting (is that even allowed on this TI-Nspire forum?!?)

Hoping that these prove to be of use in your school too, to help support the integration of technology across subjects where you are.

Nevil

And here's a wee plug for my two sessions at the forthcoming T3 International 2012 Conference in Chicago:

Sat 3 March 2012. 10-11am. Session 217.

"More Kilts and CAS"

In 2009 I started exploring how to use Computer Algebra Systems (CAS) handhelds to help teach mathematics

in Scotland. My first 18 months’ experiences were shared at the 2011 T3™ International Conference, in

my session titled ‘Kilts and CAS’. A video of that session and all its resources can be downloaded from

www.calculatorsoftware.co.uk/cas. ‘More Kilts and CAS’ gives an update from the last 12 months, more

activities I’ve designed and more lessons both my students and I have learned. No students’ algebraic

skills were harmed in the development of this session – quite the opposite, in fact.

Sun 4 March 2012. 8:30-10:30. CAS Power Session

"International Perspectives on Using CAS Technology"

A panel presentation from the following speakers:

Dr. M. Kathleen Heid, The Pennsylvania State University, USA

Nevil Hopley, George Watson's College, Edinburgh, Scotland

Dr. Mike Thomas, The University of Aukland, New Zealand

Computer algebra systems (CAS) have been used around the world in varying degrees and time spans, and with differing student populations. Three expert researchers will share their perspectives of the powerful benefits of CAS and its use in Scotland, the U.S., and New Zealand. 

And the full conference program can be downloaded from this link:

http://education.ti.com/downloads/pdf/pd/T3-2012-program-guide.pdf

Thanks for reading this far

Nevil