Calculating Calculators

            Technology has improved tremendously over the years from personal use to educational use. As a future teacher, I do not believe in the traditional ways of teaching a classroom through lectures and memorization. Teaching and learning are supposed to be interactive, hands on, visual, and authentic. Now a days technology could play a great role in supporting lesson plans, to meet the needs of students.

            Over the years, teachers and students have been using calculators in math classes, and no matter the math class one is usually needed. I know that I have needed a calculator for every math class I have taken from a young age to now in college, but what does a calculator really do? There are many types, but here are some of the most popular used today. There are standard calculators, which are to add, subtract, multiply and divide. There are fraction calculators that allow the conversion of decimals to fractions and vice versa. There are scientific calculators, which are used to solve problems in science, engineering in math. Scientific calculators usually include scientific notation, logarithmic functions, exponential functions, constants, conversion of units, variables, calculus notations, equation solving, probability, statistics, complex numbers, and fractions. There are graphing calculators used to graph functions for visual representation of a trend. There are area calculators that make solving for the area of any shape easier. Then there are other calculators that help students prepare for the adult life, such as mortgage calculator, loan calculator, lease calculator, and currency calculator, which are self-explanatory. Then there are calculators for fun like love calculators, which predict the likeness that two people will be together. Each of these calculators plays a role in the student’s understanding of math.

            There are endless possibilities with what can be done with a calculator and teach. A calculator is beneficial for a student to see a problem better, look at a problem from a different approach, or to understand the problem. In math, there are always various representations, such as a function, a graph, a chart, and more. Not every student learns the same, so each representation can help a student more than another. Doing each of these three representations could sometimes be time consuming, even if a student already knows how to do each. However, with a TI-84, a TI-Inspire, or any other advanced calculator, a student can do each of these in a matter of seconds, compare the three different representations, observe what is going on and make a judgment about which is the best to represent the given data. There are even talking calculators for students who are visually impaired.

            It is just as important for a student to know how to apply their math skills on paper, as how to apply them on a calculator. Once a student has a full understanding on the material, it is important to teach them how to do it on the calculator as well for a few reasons. The first reason being certain things in math could be time consuming like graphing, while using a calculator takes a few seconds for results. This reason allows students to get answers for various problems, while comparing and contrasting the solutions for understanding as to why the results are different. An example would be graphing different scenarios and comparing the data trend for each scenario to make predictions and understand why the trends are different. This would be a lot faster on the calculator than by hand. The second reason is that although math skills are great to have, jobs do not require employees to do the work by hand, but to get the work done fast and effectively using technology/equipment to complete projects, like Statisticians. The final reason is calculators allow students to check their work, to see if they did it correctly. It is only natural to have human error and to make silly mistakes, calculators allow student to check their work and find their mistakes, so they will learn not to do it again. Overall, calculators are enlightening and are supplementary for students learning math today. Calculators are also portable, some are pocket sized, most are inexpensive for its functions, and some are even solar powered.

Technology Autobiography

Nowadays it is strange to meet a person who does not depend on technology. Technology is all around us from cellphones to the doors from local supermarkets. It has affected our world for the better and even for the worse. The most important technology that I use is my cellphone, and I find myself never leaving my home without it. My cellphone is my handheld information; from it, I receive news, social, and media updates. With just a few clicks away, any question that puzzles me can be accessed anywhere I am on the go. As a student this resource is beneficial whenever I am doing work. However, there is always a “but” to every good thing. Although cellphones could be very resourceful, not everything on the internet is true and I find myself having the terrible habit like many others of using improper English while using my phone. It is difficult sometimes to distinguish what is true or not on the internet, but it is the most practical technology with access to the internet. Whether it is to Google something or to simply respond to a text words are often shortened, sentences are usually run-ons, and no capitalization is used for faster replies. This downfall, also mentioned in the video may influence many students as it affects me sometimes. Just because this type of English is acceptable on cellphones does not make it acceptable in real life scenarios such as schools or jobs, so I always have to proof read my work to make sure I do not use any of these.

My laptop is the second technology that has influenced me the most; I am even using it right now. Like my cellphone, I use my laptop to look up information.  I use it for research papers, schoolwork that I have difficulties with, and for video tutorials when I want to watch how to do something. However as stated before these things are great, but sometimes it is hard to tell what is true and what is not on the internet. Aside from that being on my laptop can be very distracting. I find myself procrastinating while doing my work because there are so many things to do like social media, games, or even chatting with people.

            The third technology that I use the most is my television. Although I cannot control when and where I access the information for my television, it enables me to learn things, which I did not know or even think of. Whenever I watch television, it allows me to learn about the most recent news events, some, which I knew, and others, which I had no, idea had occurred. The news covers many things all around which I would not even think about looking up. Additionally, there are specific channels that I could learn different types of information, such as news channel, weather channel, sports channel, cooking channels and entertainment channel. Each one of these channels allows me to learn different types of information. Overall, having access to this information has been beneficial and has to be true, if on these channels. Although I have access to these channels I only watch then occasionally and use television mostly for my personal use, to watch my shows, which are not educational.

There are several similarities and differences between the way the students in the video and I use technology. More than one student has mentioned laptop and cellphones, which are my top two technologies. Like two of the students mentioned my phone is always with me at all times where ever I am an it is used mainly as a way of communication through texting. In addition, one of the students mentioned how she dislikes when people abbreviate words when texting, which are not actual English words. Almost everyone I know does this. Like these students, I also use my laptop for social media and looking up things when I need assistance. Although two out of three of the items I mentioned the students also did, they did not mention the television, but rather mentioned some gaming systems. I am not sure whether it is because the students seem to be younger than I am in the video, but video games having been as influential to me as they are to the students in the video. The times I have played video games were just to pass time or to have some fun. Overall, there are not many differences except the one mentioned.