Re: RPN (was Re: TI-83+)
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Re: RPN (was Re: TI-83+)
> >High school students everywhere in the counrty are
> >required to buy graphing calculators for math class. These are not (with
a
> >small number of exceptions) people of intelligence enough to learn RPN.
>
> I simply will not buy the argument that it takes someone of above average
> intelligence to put the plus sign after the two numbers. Anyone who is
smart
> enough to be required to buy a graphing calculator is smart enough to type
in 2
> 3 + rather than 2 + 3. It's not hard. It might be like relearning to tie
your
> shoes a different way, but that doesn't make it hard...just different.
>
> >No, people enjoy doing it on the calculator the way it is done on paper.
>
> Your argument fails here because parentheses are not on the paper either.
It
> doesn't take a mental conversion. All you have to do is look in the
middle of
> the equation first. Looking at an equation on paper and punching it into
your
> calculator with parentheses involves as much "mental conversion" as
punching in
> that same equation in RPN.
Unless students have gotten much dumber than back in 1969-'73 when I was in
high school, they should have no problem with RPN. We had no trouble at all
learning to use the HP 35. Of course there were no algebraic scientific
calculators on the market at the time so we had nothing to unlearn.
Tom Lake
ICQ #25589135
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