---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Mon, 11 Feb 2002 17:25:02 -0700 From: GAYLE CLOKE <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Gene Mechtly <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: Math Within, 2002 Jan
Dear Professor Mechtly: We appreciate your response to our article. We agree with you about the importance of teaching the metric system to students. For my own part, I wish that I had cited the metric units first, then the customary in parentheses. There are a couple of your comments that I would like to respond to. You state that "Official Olympic data are almost 100% in the SI form of metric units of measurement, as school children will observe when they visit saltlake2002.com. If non-SI units are included at all, they are printed in *secondary* locations." A question you ask is "In the exercise "Hold on to your hat!" for the fastest luge track, why are "feet", "miles", and "MPH" used?" The figure 90 MPH was obtained at the website <http://www.saltlake2002.com/x/f/frame.htm?u=/x/m/int/sloc_sport. htm> which is accessed from the SLOC home page by going to "Sports", then "Luge". This article on the website refers several times to 90 MPH. I wish I had thought to change it to kilometers per hour, but would still have included the 90 MPH figure in parentheses. The political reality is that American children are still more familiar with MPH than kilometers per hour. I wish that wasn't so. In the article where the cost of driving is being calculated, the car is owned by an American couple who are transporting their Canadian friends. The odometer would give the reading in miles, not kilometers, as would most cars that U.S. students are familiar with. Therefore, I think it appropriate to do the initial calculations in miles, then think about the metric system that Canadians are used to. In this case, this was a conscious decision. We no longer write the Math By the Month section. Ours was a one-year non-paid assignment. You may wish to express your concerns to Sandy Berger. She is on the editorial staff of the NCTM journals. I hope you will read previous and future editions of our Math By the Month sections. We wrote that feature for the journals published from September 2001 to May 2002. I hope you will find some activities useful to you or your students. Gayle Cloke On 10 Feb 2002, at 13:40, Gene Mechtly wrote: Dear Editors of TCM: NCTM webnews led me to the article Light The Math Within, which begins on page 280 of "Teaching Children Mathematics" (TCM) 2002 January. I am pleased that the article cites <www.saltlake2002.com.> which is the Web address of official Olympic data. Official Olympic data are almost 100% in the SI form of metric units of measurement, as school children will observe when they visit saltlake2002.com. If non-SI units are included at all, they are printed in *secondary* locations. Accordingly, temperatures in the exercise "Cold as ice" on page 281 would more appropriately have been written as -9 degreesC (16 degreesF) for "fast ice" preferred by hockey players, and written as -5.5 degreesC (22 degreesF) for "soft ice" preferred by figure skaters. Note that I have substituted the word "degrees" for its symbol to preclude faulty transmission by e-mail over the Internet. Also note that, the international convention is "-9 degreesC" but *not* "-9degrees C" i.e. the space is placed between the number and the *unit symbol* rather than between the degree symbol and C (for Celsius). Consult <www.nist.gov> to confirm this standard format. In the exercise "Travel cents" which is based on the fact that "Canadians use the metric system" why are non-metric units used. In the exercise "Hold on to your hat!" for the fastest luge track, why are "feet", "miles", and "MPH" used? Official Olympic data are posted almost exclusively in metric units. There are almost *no* "feet", "miles", or "MPH" to burden Olympians. Antiquated non-metric units are now residual only in the USA. They are presently being discarded for almost all legal commerce and trade in the United Kingdom in compliance with requirements of the European Union. Please convey these thoughts to the author(s) of the article. Thanks. Eugene A. Mechtly University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign (uiuc) 1406 West Green Street Urbana, IL 61801
