[Blindmath] Texas Instruments Graphing Calculator TI84 Plus

[Tim in 't Veld]

Rosanne,
I don't know about the US but here in the Netherlands the TI84 is the 
standard in secondary school and it forms an integral part of our 
mathematics curriculum (the books contain exercises which guide student 
through the calculation on the TI84). As you are probably aware it is 
not accessible for visually impaired students and that is a major hurdle 
to take in secondary school. Accessible, easy to use alternatives would 
certainly make life a lot easier for many secondary school students.

There is no accessible TI84 alternative that I know of. The audio 
graphing calculator by Viewplus technologies (http://www.viewplus.com) 
can perform many TI84 functions but is not a full replacement and has 
not been updated for many years.

When I was in secondary school I did without a graphical calculator. I 
could usually perform calculations using quick calculator (a very old 
software scientific calculator) and Excel. I don'tt think I missed much, 
the graphical calculator is just a tool which is not at all necessary to 
understand mathematics to say the least (the first lesson for freshmen 
in most science faculties is to leave that device home). But that's just 
my personal opinion.

Tim

On 5/21/2012 5:12 PM, Rosanne Hoffmann wrote:
> Hello All,
> Please comment on the Texas Instruments graphing calculator, model TI84 Plus. Is it the primary scientific graphing calculator in US school districts for sighted students? Is there a demand or need for this calculator to be accessible to students who are visually impaired/blind? Are there math textbooks that contain problems to be solved with the TI84 Plus? Are there calculators made by other companies that compete with Texas Instruments? Thanks for any information.
>
> Rosanne Hoffmann, Ph.D.
> STEM Project Leader
> Educational Research
> American Printing House for the Blind
> 1839 Frankfort ave.
> Louisville, KY 40206
> 502-899-2292
> rhoffmann at aph.org
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Blindmath mailing list
> Blindmath at nfbnet.org
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/blindmath_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for Blindmath:
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/blindmath_nfbnet.org/tim%40dvlop.nl