I love my graphing calculator, and my TI-85 has been with me since Junior year of high school (a little over 17 years), BUT the crushing vice for me will eventually include a netbook with Mathematica, Matlab, PowerToy Calculator, SAGE, and/or Maxima installed on it.

I mean, the technology in a TI-84 Plus Silver Mega Titanium (I’m half-joking with the name) is like 1% more advanced than the TIs I used in high school 16 years ago. And yet the price is still $100+. That’s ridiculous.

I teach IMP, so we do a lot with the calculators, and when I show stuff to the kids, you’d think they were using an abacus. “Why isn’t the line straight?” is a common question. Additionally, the kids want to know where the equal sign is and why when tracing a line on a graph the coordinates displayed represent the points of the pixel and not the points on the line. They dig the capabilities of what the calculators can do, but are frustrated with using them.

I feel bad making them mandatory because I feel like I’m upholding the TI monopoly.

My students aren’t allowed to use any device capable of networking during a provincial exam. The unfortunate truth is that unless the nature of those exams is turned on its head, I *need* to teach them how to solve things using the overpriced calculators because they’re the only things left that are archaic enough to be offline.

(Which is not to say I won’t teach them to use other technology as well, but it means they’re stuck paying for it.)

Pathetic.

Suspension bridges’ cables follow a parabola whereas hanging bridges and hanging chains follow a catenary. Students probably won’t appreciate the difference until 2nd or 3rd semester Calculus. For future civil engineers the distinction is important.