Re: [MATHEDCC] technology/fractions

John Sheehan (jsheehan@NETCOM.COM)
Wed, 24 Sep 1997 13:11:24 -0700 (PDT)

sslitine@mail.utexas.edu said:

>>How many times during your life (not in school) you added (1/3) + (1/17)
>>and multiplied (3/47)(17/53)...
>>We are not only in a technology era but speed era

Do you honestly believe that someone who cannot deal with (1/3) + (1/17)
is going to have enough facility with operations with
rational expressions to understand

f(x+h) - f(x)
lim -------------
h->0 h

when the time comes? Or to follow the manipulations for a simple example
2
like f(x) = x ? If you change the second example to finding
(3/34)(17/54), then I think it would be an appropriate arithmetic
exercise. And ask the students how they would do it with a 3-digit
calculator.

John Sheehan
jsheehan@netcom.com

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