[MATHEDCC] calculus:def of slope

Syrilda Miller (symiller@eclipse.net)
Sat, 26 Sep 1998 14:10:11 -0700

I have been looking at applets on several web sites to use in teaching
my calculus class. Some define slope in a slightly different way than I
normally do. This has made me curious about what other teachers on
this list use.
I define slope as the change in y divided by the change in x. (In
various circumstances I use several other common forms as well.) Do
any of you say " the change in y when the change in x is 1" Now, of
course this is the same numerical value that my definition would give.
I can see both advantages and problems with each version. I plan to
continue using my original version, but if I see that many of you use
the "change in y when the change in x is one" version, I will add that
to my repertoire.

If you are curious about the sites I have seen, here are some:

1. http://www.ies.co.jp/math/java/heihen/heihen.html

2.
http://www.univie.ac.at/future.media/moe/galerie/geom1/geom1.html#anstieg

The second site is part of a really terrific site :
http://www.univie.ac.at/future.media/moe/galerie.html
(If you go there let me know if you have a problem seeing all of their
page. I loose about 15% of the right hand side or the bottom. I wrote
to them but their suggestion for correcting the difficulty didn't help.)

Syrilda

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