MATH TOOLS NEWSLETTER - AUGUST 7, 2004 - No. 17

  Twenty-one participants who traveled to Philadelphia and
  twenty-four online members of the Math Tools community spent
  last week getting familiar with the recently implemented
  features of the Math Tools site. They have collaborated to
  create classroom activities, software-related resources, and
  services for themselves and others.

       http://mathforum.org/workshops/toolfest04/

  ***FEATURED DISCUSSION
  Teaching Mathematics as a Science
  http://mathforum.org/mathtools/discuss.html?do=m&thread=_____round-99
  Bethany writes, "It seems that the pervading philosophy of
  teaching and learning mathematics is pushing us as educators [...]
  to make math more of a discovery process than just giving students
  the concepts and trying to process them.... What do you think?

  ***FEATURED DISCUSSION
  Your Favorite Tools
  http://mathforum.org/mathtools/discuss.html?do=m&thread=_____round-98
  Don Link started this thread in the Roundtable Discussion and a
  few other people have chimed in so far. He writes, "I'm fairly
  new to the Math Tools community, and I thought it would be useful
  if some of you 'longer-timers' would share your N favorite tools
  cataloged on the site (I'm thinking like your top 10, but any value
  of N would be fine)."

  ***FEATURED DISCUSSION
  Traffic Jam Activity
  http://mathforum.org/mathtools/discuss.html?do=m&thread=_____round-95
  The Traffic Jam Activity was our first Tool Fest activity. Read
  comments noted during our face-to-face discussion and also
  thoughts posted by the community as they tried the activity.

  ***FEATURED TOOL
  Tool: Parabola in Standard Form (Java Sketchpad version)
  Annie Fetter
  http://mathforum.org/mathtools/tool.html?id=12142
  This applet, created with Java Sketchpad, allows the exploration
  of a parabola in standard form, where the coefficients a, b, and c
  are restricted to multiples of 1/2. A sister sketch allows
  unrestricted coefficients.

  ***FEATURED TOOL
  Tool: Parabola in Standard Form (Sketch)
  Annie Fetter
  http://mathforum.org/mathtools/tool.html?id=12146
  This sketch allows the manipulation of a parabola in standard form.
  On the first page, the coefficients a, b, and c are restricted to
  multiples of 0.5. On the second page, they are unrestricted and
  can be set to exact numbers using the "fine controls."

  ***FEATURED TOOL
  Tool: Centers of Triangles
  Wing Kuen Cheng
  http://mathforum.org/mathtools/tool.html?id=12260
  See the different centers of a triangle and how they relate
  to the medians, perpendicular bisectors, and altitudes of the
  triangle. Students can manipulate the triangle and try to answer
  the follow-up questions at the bottom.


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                   The Math Forum -- 7 August 2004