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Re: Re: Mathematica for gifted elementary school children

• To: mathgroup at smc.vnet.net
• Subject: [mg98919] Re: [mg98902] Re: Mathematica for gifted elementary school children
• From: Murray Eisenberg <murray at math.umass.edu>
• Date: Wed, 22 Apr 2009 05:08:25 -0400 (EDT)
• Organization: Mathematics & Statistics, Univ. of Mass./Amherst
• References: <gsivc0$995$1@smc.vnet.net> <200904210910.FAA24543@smc.vnet.net>
• Reply-to: murray at math.umass.edu

But interacting with the demonstrations, while it can be educational, is 
not really being very creative or being engaged in learning Mathematica 
(unless one studies the code -- which tends to be rather more 
sophisticated than a rank beginner would want to see).

Doing computations oneself, building graphic images oneself -- those 
things can be educational and creative and contribute toward learning 
Mathematica and learning how to learn Mathematica.

Sort of the difference between playing a video game and creating a video 
game.

Bob F wrote:
> On Apr 20, 5:09 pm, Beliavsky <beliav... at aol.com> wrote:
>> My son, almost 6, is good at math and inquisitive. Is there a math
>> curriculum for elementary school children that uses Mathematica? He
>> understands the four arithemetic operations and the concept of powers.
>> I have Mathematica installed on my home PC and could teach him myself.
>>
>> I have written computer programs in Fortran in front of him to
>> demonstrate concepts such as cubes and cube roots. We had fun, but I
>> don't want to explain right now why 1000000000**3 gives -402653184 or
>> 1/2 gives 0.
>>
>> He is interested in the number "centillion" (10^303) and thought it
>> was cool to see the 101 zeros when we asked Mathematica to compute
>> centillion^(1/3).
>>
>> I see there are some math courseware athttp://library.wolfram.com/infocenter/Courseware/Mathematics/
>> , but those topics are too advanced for him at present. Maybe I should
>> give him Wolfram's huge book and let him play when he wants.
> 
> Try looking thru the demonstrations web site (at http://demonstrations.wolfram.com
> ). There are some really nice things and some are very well
> illustrated and fun to play with. There is even a "Kids and Fun"
> section at http://demonstrations.wolfram.com/topics.html#10
> 
> Enjoy...
> 
> -Bob
> 

-- 
Murray Eisenberg                     murray at math.umass.edu
Mathematics & Statistics Dept.
Lederle Graduate Research Tower      phone 413 549-1020 (H)
University of Massachusetts                413 545-2859 (W)
710 North Pleasant Street            fax   413 545-1801
Amherst, MA 01003-9305

• Follow-Ups:
  • Re: Re: Re: Mathematica for gifted elementary school children
    • From: "Ingolf Dahl" <ingolf.dahl@telia.com>

• References:
  • Re: Mathematica for gifted elementary school children
    • From: Bob F <deepyogurt@gmail.com>