[blindkid] Math technology

Sat Apr 10 14:33:33 UTC 2010

Heather:

With great respect, balderdash! While graphs certainly can give you a feel 
for the data and this is certainly important in making initial assessments 
of the reliability of data and getting an initial impresssion of what it's 
telling you, it it is mathematical computation gets the answer.

I'm not saying that graphs aren't important. I *am* saying that they are not 
the only way and, in the end, aren't the basis for scientific calculation 
although they may tweak one's scientific intuition. And yes, I know about 
Feynman diagrams. But even these are only reasoning aids, if extremely 
sophisticated, ingenious ones.

Mike

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Heather" <craney07 at rochester.rr.com>
To: "NFBnet Blind Kid Mailing List,(for parents of blind children)" 
<blindkid at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Saturday, April 10, 2010 4:24 AM
Subject: Re: [blindkid] Math technology

Graphs are only crutches?  That is the sort of thinking that puts blind
people at a disadvantage.  You show me higher level science and math where
you might have two hundred pieces of data to look at to determine whether
the effects of an experement are strongly corilated to the manipulated
variable, and someone who can look at a list of data points and come up with
sound observations that you would trust to produce the information that your
blood transfusion or the plain that you are flying in depends on.  Without
graphs there would be no cancer research, no advances in technology that
helps blind people.  Not to mention that some blind children are visual
learners, and need to see it in front of them in a raised line format, for
others a verbal or auditory depiction works well.  To discount one
particular learning style out of hand is a very short sighted way of
thinking.  While I do agree with you that I personally, being a very visual
learner, don't see how a technology that produces auditory feedback for
describing a graph would really work, I do think that for some children this
would work.  And, for others the math concept would be incomprehensable with
out a tactal graphic.  To imply that a math teacher is not good if she can't
convey completely in words to a blind student what a cubed root graph
rereflected through the origin, expanded by a degree of 2 and transfered
five units to the lefft and eight units up, is unfounded and insulting to
teachers who work very hard to accomidate all children with all special
needs and to be masters of their specialty.  I know some people are going to
disagree with me, someone always does, because I'm just not all PC like that
and I always seem to have something to say.  lol
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mike Freeman" <k7uij at panix.com>
To: "NFBnet Blind Kid Mailing List,(for parents of blind children)"
<blindkid at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Friday, April 09, 2010 11:07 PM
Subject: Re: [blindkid] Math technology

Pat:

I'm sure many will disagree with me here but I could never fathom how audio
could accurately convey graphics to the blind. In my book, graphs are only
crutches to illustrate abstract concepts and math teachers are only as good
as they can deal with the abstractions without needing to "picture"
everything.

Mike Freman, B.A. and M.S. in physics

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Pat Renfranz" <dblair2525 at msn.com>
To: "blindkid" <blindkid at nfbnet.org>
Sent: Friday, April 09, 2010 2:36 PM
Subject: [blindkid] Math technology

My daughter will be taking Algebra II next year in 9th grade. She uses
Braille/Nemeth texts with tactile graphics. She's gotten by just fine with
relatively low-tech math tools.

We are wondering if it would be useful for her to start using an accessible
graphing calculator. Does anyone have any practical advice on using one of
these programs? I am looking into the Audio Graphing Calculator from
ViewPlus and Math Trax from NASA. They both produce an audio signal
representing the shape of the function, while the AGC has the advantage of
being able to produce tactile graphs on a Tiger embosser. Maybe there are
other products available? Our school district has no experience with any of
them. Does anyone¹s teenager think this software is worth learning?

We are a little nervous about this, because our experience has been that,
math is great because you can pretty much always count on a Brailler, paper,
and sticky dots from the hardware store to NOT fail and to NOT require
specialized training that gets in the way of actually learning the
material...

Thanks in advance for any help.
Pat
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