I'm glad to see Marilyn reply. I will put a plug in for a book I found for =
my 13 year old daughter Hope. The book is called "Algebra Unplugged", =
sorry I don't remember the names of the the authors. I purchased the book =
at Barnes and Noble. A mathematician and a writer worked together and =
really have some nice ways for people to look at many of the beginning =
algebra concepts.=20
Now I may not relay this the same way they did, this is from memory. The =
introduce the idea of positives and negatives in terms of a hot air =
balloon. A positive would be adding heat or helium, which would cause the =
balloon to rise. A negative would be adding a sandbag, which would cause =
the balloon to go down. I think they would say then, consider what it =
means to take a sandbag off the balloon. What effect would this have? =
Subtracting a negative would cause the balloon to rise. Now what if we =
took off several sandbags. This would be equivalent to multiplying a =
negative by a negative.=20
Well, atleast that's the way I remember it. My daughter still had and has =
questions but this book opened her eyes to some of these beginning algebra =
concepts.=20
Nic LaHue
Usually just a lurker on the list.
Nic LaHue
Mathematics Department
Penn Valley Community College
3201 Southwest Trafficway
Kansas City, MO 64111
>>> Phil Mahler <mahlerp@middlesex.cc.ma.us> 11/07 4:12 PM >>>
to see this in the popular press - that's more important than the actual
question.
Of course maybe someone has a better answer to Sandy's original question.
Phil Mahler
Middlesex CC
Springs Road
Bedford, MA
Here's a question from my 83 fifth-grade math students, who keep asking me
what your answer is: "in real life, when would you ever multiply (or
divide, for that matter) two negative numbers?" The closest I've come up
with is, "if you didn't get what you didn't want, that's positive."
-Sandy Hindy, Westlake Village, Calif.
Forget this kind of justification for studying math. It's as irrelevant as
asking a question like, "In real life, when would you ever do a sit-up?"
Unless you work as a trainer, you wouldn't. That doesn't mean you should
complain about doing sit-ups as part of physical conditioning.
People need to be in good intellectual condition too. Even if you're not
going to make heavy use of math in your profession, you still need to know
how to think logically. Tell the kids I said that studying math
accomplishes two goals: It prepares some kids to think like scientists,
and it prepares all the rest of them to think, period.
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