The New HP39GII

Posted on May 3, 2012 by Chris

I’ve now had a good time to work with the new HP39GII graphing calculator. It is exactly what you would want if you have been using HP39/40GS or a TI84 or a Casio FX9750 and you are ready for a really fast processor, tons of memory, a grey scale hi-resolution screen and batteries that last forever. The HP39/40GS series is a classic graphing calculator with a very smooth operating system built around apps all of which are controlled by the three ‘multiple representations’ keys … symbolic, plot and table. The HP39GII works in exactly the same way, so you know straight away what to do. But everything works really well. On the home screen calculations can be shown in textbook display with quotients and indices shown correctly. Divisions are shown fraction form where needed and an approx key comes up which converts to a decimal approximation. The graphing screen is superb. Clear smooth lines, clear dark axes and subtle grey grid lines. Pressing the + or – keys zooms in and out. Everything happens really fast.

A major new feature is the App notes. Teachers will want the activities set up for students use, so they can set up an app (say by creating an initial set of functions to explore) then create a notes page describing the activity and telling students what to do. On the app just choose to save, give it a name for the activity and then you have a new app set up as you want with full activity instructions to share out amongst the students. Superfast handheld activity authoring. Naturally teachers will use the free emulator to create the pages using a computer keyboard and then drag and drop onto the first calculator for sharing in class.

One of the critical features of a graphing calculator is accessibility and reliability. The teacher wants to trust that they can pick up the box of machines before the lessons and they will all work. The HP39GII still runs on standard AAA batteries (6 alkalines for 99p everywhere!) but there has been a major redesign in the power management. The batteries work in serial which means that it can even run on a single battery. It is reported that 6 months later they are still going strong.

I’ve started work on updating my activities pack to take account of the HP39GII features and show it’s screen shots, so look out for that. Also, I’m writing up my work from the cape Town trip to integrate teacher led GeoGebra activities with student activity on the HP39GII. Both of these should be ready for the official launch in June. The really good thing in these belt tightening times is that the HP39GII looks like it will be selling for less than the machines it replaces and much less than new machines from TI and Casio, so I am really hoping that this will encourage users of TI-84s and FX9750s to upgrade and build a community where we can develop and share materials and activities. Critically this is the way of getting ICT activity into the hands of students with no booking, no worries, but with a clear bright screen and well documented activities.

As an intriguing bonus, ICT teachers may be pleased to hear that it can be programmed using a language akin to C++, which has been extensively developed and documented (because the Chinese market saw this as a priority). Again, the development work will be done on the emulator for fast typing, but you now have a handheld programme test environment which works straight out of the box (just like the BBC micro that Eric Schmidt says gave us the lead in games software that government (rightly) thinks we can recover).

We will be offering nationwide training sessions to schools and ITE programmes and there will be extremely attractive prices for teachers to get a machine to play with. Look out for news of that. I am setting up a web site at www.hpgraphingcalcs.org which will hold all of the support materials and discussion threads for the new machine (and the older ones as well). That will be launching very soon.

See here for a view of the screen and the device: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxtSG8fzCsA

Details for Spain: The Calculator Store and Update

More screen shots and ready to buy in the Netherlands (in Dutch): Here

An HP discussion thread: Here

HP Product details: Here

Why Learn Maths

Posted on April 23, 2012 by Chris

Just before Easter I ran a session for the A Level mathematics groups in the Harris Academy group in South East London. I can tell you it was pretty daunting in the small hall, but with something like 120 sixth form students, who had chosen me over another talk, about options, I think. However, can I publicly thank (a) the teachers at Harris Crystal Palace who invited me and most especially (b) the students who attended for reminding me what fun it is to talk about maths to young people. I’ll be applying for a teaching job again, next … Continue reading →

Central London Maths Trail

Posted on March 27, 2012 by Chris

Now that the weather has turned out so lovely, why not do the central London maths trail. I have rebranded it as the ATM/MA London branch trail and corrected all of the errors identified in our try out walk last month. Thanks to everyone who contributed.

Click to download a copy of the updated trail in docx Central london Trail or in pdf Central London Trail PDF. Continue reading →

Cape Town Maths

Posted on March 20, 2012 by Chris

Two weeks ago, I had a very nice trip down to Cape Town. It is a very beautiful city indeed. However, I did a series of sessions mixing HP Graphing Calculators, GeoGebra and Data Streaming to groups of maths teachers, trainee maths teachers and undergraduate engineering students at the Cape Penninsula Technical University and the University of the Western Cape. South Africa, in the post apartheid era has been trying to bring all of its education systems up to the level of the former elite schools. As you can imagine, this is a tough task, although the government’s commitment is clear having one of the highest proportional spends on education anywhere in the world. The universities I visited are excellent examples of that move to change and I was delighted to work with really enthusiastic students and teachers. Continue reading →

Brunel AND Nelson in King’s

Posted on March 14, 2012 by Chris

The ATM/MA london Branch was treated to on of Peter Ransom’s barnstorming performaces last Saturday. A big message that we share with our PGCE students is that teaching is a performance art and ensuring that your lessons have a good dose of theatre will bring students in to your message. Well, Peter brings avery big dose of theatre. Right down to the brilliant stand-up touches … is he really going to drop the cannon ball? Well, yes, naturally. We got through transformational geometry, force functions in suspension bridge chains, cannon ball stacking sequences and the destructive impact of cannon balls by linear and quadratic scaling. So, no messing maths. Please come back soon to see the photos … and come to our next session which will be 10:30 Saturday 24th March (King’s College London, the Franklin Wilkins Building on Stamford Street, SE1, just down from the IMAX cinema), which is the Danny Brown maths Workshops. Read all about it at Danny’s site: www.makemaths.com

Maths Trails

Posted on January 21, 2012 by Chris

The ATM/MA London branch meeting today was a wander round Parliament Square, up Whitehall and Round Trafalgar Square. Four groups of maths teachers made the trek and were intrigued to see this most famous bit of London in a different light. The trail is one of a number that I prepared during my time working for maths Year 2000 and it’s great to see it used again. To support the session, I set up a new web sight with the great URL of www.mathstrails.org.uk . You’ll find PDF and Word versions of all of my trails plus links and details of a load of other trails and trail related materials. Please visit and most especially, please contribute, you maths trail fans with your own ideas, materials and stories.

In the end, it’s just great to get out and about and look at things in a different way. So, take the opportunity and get your students out too!

Mathematics <> Calculating

Posted on January 17, 2012 by Chris

There is much to agree with in Conrad Wolfram’s lecture in TED.

In Uncle Petros and Goldbach’s Conjecture Doxiadis’ main character refers to anything in a mathemaical problem that could be done by a machine as ‘shopping maths’. Wolfram has the same view and asserts that we should focus on those elements in the problem solving process that are NOT shopping maths. So far, so good. The problem is that Wolfram is stuck in a world that sees practical problem solving as somehow mathematical. He even uses the tired example of keeping track of your mortgage. Clearly people actually do this by looking at their statement and seeing how much they are paying, they do not engage with the calculations required to analyse the payments. As he says, in the real world, solutions are messy. The trick is (a) to develop opportunties to solve such messy problems in a school setting while keeping them real and (b) to put learners into settings where they actually care about the outcomes to the problems. Serious past experience does not auger well for the possibilities.

It is also troubling that doing mathematics by hand is ridiculed quite so comprehensively. Those quirky souls in the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences at Cambridge had chalk boards fitted in the seminar rooms, specifically to ensure that they can do their mathematics by hand. The problem for Wolfram is that he sees mathematical activity as necessarily applied. He is right to critique a school curriculum which is essentially a curriculum in pure mathematics dressed up as somehow useful, with a cloth of applicationm draped over an algorithm exercise. However, that does not mean that we should only be solving problems coming from the ‘real-world’, implying the entirely mathematical, i.e. pure-maths world is not why we should be teaching maths.

It is a genuinely good thing to see these sentiments aired and tempts the next steps … (i) an inclusive view of mathematics as an end in itself and a language for application, and (ii) a critical, credible view of how such thinking can be formatted for an institutional, compulsory, age specific, school system such as we work with.

My Dear Watson

Posted on January 9, 2012 by Chris

So, the producers of the new Sherlock Holmes movie went to real Oxford mathematicians to give a blackboard full of maths look authentic, but they go got more than they bargained for. They developed a code based on clues left for Moriaty’s interests and specialisms and even scripted a lecture he is shown giving. Now imagine the possibilities for the classroom. The desire to keep it real, consistent and authentic, even though no-one would ever check. That’s the real mathematical mind at work!

We have a neat double sided version of an old pub game called shut-the-box. You roll two dice and flip down numbered pieces totaling the dice score, your score is what’s left when you cannot go. There have been two types of response from secondary maths teachers to this:

1. That’s much too easy for our kids.

2. How could I analyse and describe the structure of this game.

I think we can call this the shut-the-box test to find out where people actually teach mathematics.

Our Island Life Game

Posted on January 6, 2012 by Chris

Island Life is a game for ages 8 to 13 (but is great to play by anyone). There are two versions, both of which come with the same board, but are different games with different components.
The board shows three holiday islands with a range of exciting attractions, linked by rail, road and ferry. Naturally, you will be cycling around these dream islands, so you choose a coloured bicycle and rider as your playing piece. Continue reading →

It’s the Maths we care about

Posted on January 5, 2012 by Chris

I am currently interviewing candidates for the 2012/13 PGCE maths. We expect fees for the course to be in excess of £9000 this year, but there is still a bursary for those coming in to teaching. There has been great publicity about the present secretary of state’s interest in teachers with highly accredited subject knowledge, so the bursaries are £20K if you have a 1st, £15K for a 2:1 and £12K for a 2:2. If you have a 3rd in your first degree, no support is given, so you will not get a place. Now it is deeply arguable as to whether there is any relationship between the class of your degree and your abilities as a teacher. However, when you find out that the subject of the degree is not relavent, nor is the University it came from, then you simply have to look in awe and wonder and ask if the DfE did this after a drunken night out and forgot to review. It is seriously the case that a candidate with a 1st in Spanish (and presumably a maths enhancement course) from AnyWhere Uni will get £20K and someone with a 2:2 in Pure Maths from Cambridge will get £12K to become a maths teacher. If someone has Mr Gove’s ear, please check that he really means this. I cannot believe he does.

Charmingly, Mr Gove’s maths Tsar has a 3rd in Engineering. The power of celebrity knows no bounds.

The Maths Zone

A maths blog for students, teachers and all maths folk.