Hi Raul, For many of the scalar examples at the beginning of the animations I do exactly that on the 'blackboard' at the bottom of the screen. An example is the long version Conjugate (+) animation on: http://www.jsoftware.com/jwiki/Vocabulary/plus I have also included the 'tally' representation for some of the Plus (+) examples. I am also going to add a couple of other representation styles depending on the arguments. Fractional arguments would get 'partial pie chart' representation, negative numbers will use a number line, and complex numbers a grid similar to the Conjugate example. Showing this explicitly can seem simple for an operation such as addition, but as unfamiliar operators are encountered this explanation becomes vital. I have not used the 'blackboard' on vector and matrix examples, due to lack of screen space and the fact that the scalar examples can cover the individual cases more clearly. Matrix and vector visualizations may be required when we begin to animate conjunctions and adverbs.
Cheers, bob On -Mar18-2010, at -Mar18-20105:27 AM, Raul Miller wrote: > If I were teaching a youngster about addition, I would use > tallying. > > In other words: > > 2 + 3 > > * * added to * * * > > * * * * * > > (count them) > > 5 > > Similarly for multiplication I would make rectangles and tally their contents > > If I was teaching someone with hopefully some familiarity with arithmetic > I would not go so slow and carefully over the concepts as I would with > a child, but perhaps something like this could be used for these animations? > > FYI, > > -- > Raul > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
