TI-Nspire

I had grandiose plans for the TI-Nspire in my Calculus BC class this year. Unfortunately they do not seem to have panned out. As I have previously mentioned, the design of my class is such that the textbook is really a long, long problem set. The students are assigned problems each night, then post and present their results the next day. All of the topics that I have typically covered in the BC class remain, and they are spiraled through the problems, but I do not follow the typical “present, practice, homework, test” model of teaching.

The group that I am teaching this year has demonstrated both strengths and weaknesses over last years group (the first of which I followed this model, but the 5th year in which I taught the BC class). One of the things that I am trying to help the students recognize is the proper use of technology when solving problems. Particularly at the beginning of the spiral I want them willing to use any tools they have at their disposal to help them understand the problem. By the end of the spiral, they should be practicing the skills. Last year I introduced the students to Maxima, which is an open-source CAS program. Unfortunately it is cumbersome to use for the uninitiated and requires access to a computer. So this year I had our department purchase a class set of TI-Nspire CAS calculators for the students to use. The input of the math is far more intuitive (although navigating the Menus for those intimately familiar with the TI-83 and TI-84 calculators is troublesome) and they are portable.

However, more often than not the students ignore the Nspire when they should be utilizing it and returning to their 83s and 84s. I have demonstrated some of the ways in which they can use the Nspire, and I wrote an Euler program for them to use, but they still act surprised when I suggest using it. Even when they do think to pick it up, they often give up quickly because they have trouble navigating the menus and finding what they want.

To a certain extent I think this has been my fault. While I have demonstrated some things for them, and am usually on hand to help them, I am also not as fluent on the calculator as I would like and so when they ask me something I haven’t done already or in a long while I often have to spend a few minutes working it out. Also, I am planning on making some video podcasts for next year using the TI-Nspire TE software that will walk the students through some of the more routine uses of the calculator.

We’ll see how it goes.

Catholic Church is Run by Idiots

For those of you following the story of the 9 year old girl in Brazil who was raped by her stepfather and aborted the resulting twins, this latest chapter just twists my stomach. The story is here.

As a general rule I do not believe in abortion. I subscribe to the idea that life is created at the time of conception and that it is our responsibility to foster that life as much as we can. For the most part this stems from my feeling that most of the time abortion is used as a way of avoiding the natural consequences that can occur from having sex. Our society, in general, shies away from taking responsibility for our actions, and I do not like abortion on these grounds. Pregnancy is a natural consequence of having sex, and an abortion is often used as a way of getting out of that consequence. In my view, if you want to have sex, great, enjoy it, but accept the consequences. Even if you use birth control, nothing is 100% effective, so deal with it.

At the same time, I don’t believe in legislating against other people’s stupidity, so I will never support a law to outlaw abortion.

However, this little 9 year old girl did not ask for this. And it seems pretty clear that a 9 year old’s body is not up to dealing with the consequences of trying to carry twins. Does the Church give a shit about this little girl though? Oh, they haven’t excommunicated her because she is so young – but apparently they think she is old enough to have these children. Of course they excommunicated the people around her that were looking out for her well-being. What kind of message of love does that send this traumatized little girl?

The one good thing in this whole situation is that it just reinforces that the Church doesn’t give a crap about its people – only its rules.  Wait, it’s been awhile since I was a Catholic myself, but didn’t Jesus have something to say about that?

So I have this to say to the Church. Keep it up you morons, show the world that you are becoming increasingly irrelevant. Maybe the next generation will leave you even quicker and you can fade into the obscurity you so deserve.

Oh, and as for the stepfather – castration is a good start for what should be done to you.