Calculators

Two Hundred Ninetieth Post: Calculators

I need to buy a better calculator. My old, standard, graphing calculator is 11 years old. I have a $10 one but it is not as user friendly where you can see your work like a graphing calculator. On my Palm I have the PowerOne graphing calculator, but that wouldn’t be permitted on tests. I want to get a new one with features. Texas Instruments has one that sort of has a mini OS. It upgrades the software without buying an entirely new calculator. That with the ability to plug into the computer is what makes it so powerful.

But think back to the days when the calculator was actually in many ways more powerful and useful then a personal computer. It must be the touch sensitive screen that caused PDA’s longer to be developed. That with expense and battery life could be a reason. Think about it. The ideas is there. There is a processor crunching numbers inside a calculator. Why was it so long for the PDA to be invented. Calculators use to have limited memory, but they still could hold kilobytes of memory. That is enough to hold address, numbers, and programs.

Still the calculator, though combined in PDA’s, is built around the same design of only crunching numbers and graphing. Some scientific features have been added but the function has remained the same. I guess the calculator has remained the same because it is a tool for the academic world. A student can’t use a device that could store notes or cheats for a test.

We are lucky in class when we are allowed to use the calculator. In one of my math classes the instructor said a calculator wasn’t required. It is just a conveyance we have gotten use to. I think looking up trigonometric values on a chart would increase the meaning instead of just hitting the sin or cos value on a calculator. But the graphic function allows comparison of data and little hypothesis (hunches) to be tested. Sure the math is still possible without the tools, but the tools add a new dimension.

So until we type cheats into our calculators for the test... May the Creative Force be with You