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Calculator Flaw Forces Recall in Virginia

Posted by timothy on from the slight-bump-to-the-gravy-train dept.

Jivecat writes "CNN is reporting that TI is recalling 11,000 calculators issued to students in Virginia because of a flaw that would give them an unfair advantage on standardized tests. A 12-year-old discovered that by pressing two keys at once, the calculators will convert decimals to fractions. The tests require the students to know how to do this with pencil-and-paper." So the calculator is being recalled because it's not crippled enough. Maybe it's a good time to question the wisdom of issuing expensive electronics to students in the first place, though I'm sure the calculator companies would rather you didn't.

6 of 687 comments (clear)

  1. Next To Go: '+' Sign by geomon · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Seriously, isn't this a bit of an overreation?

    So what if the calculators make it easier to convert from decimal to fraction? Train *all* of the students to use the feature and its value as an advantage.

    As for the issue of using a pencil and paper, then that is how you verify that they *know* how to make the conversion and didn't rely on the two-key method.

    Bureaucracy masked as education.

    --
    "Rocky Rococo, at your cervix!"
    1. Re:Next To Go: '+' Sign by falcon5768 · · Score: 4, Interesting
      I dissagree. Very few people in real world situations EVER need to know how to do this, and most people know the easy ones like .5, .3, .25 etc. If you where in a field where this kinds of calculations where needed all the time, then yes you would need to know how to do them. But honestly I have yet to use anything i learned beyond basic math and trig outside of my work.


      Quite frankly I find it more a crime on teaching people how to NOT find the answer, than to use a god damn calculator, especially as we start teaching what was college grade math earlier and earlier in education.


      Perfect example. prof set forth a problem that the class had to solve in 3 minutes. All the students scrambled to figure it out except one. The one got up left the room went to our advisors room grabbed a book and came back to class with the answer.
      He got the A that day cause the test wasnt the problem, it was who was going to waste their time trying to figure it out on paper when the answer was staring you in the face on the bookshelf.

      --

      "Slashdot, where telling the truth is overrated but lying is insightful."

    2. Re:Next To Go: '+' Sign by shobadobs · · Score: 3, Interesting

      You forgot turning repeating decimals into fractions.

      What is 0.4523232323 as a fraction?

      Well, it's easy; the answer's 45/100 + 23/9900, and from there it's regular simplification.

      But "everybody" knows how to turn fractions into decimals; it's just long division, whereas with repeating decimals there's a trick.

    3. Re:Next To Go: '+' Sign by jfern · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Another way to think of it:
      x = 0.4523232323...
      100x = 45.232323232323...
      99x = 44.78

      9900x = 4478
      x = 4478/9900

  2. This brings back memories by Raul654 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    In my undergraduate electromagnetics class, the professor was adamant that he would never allow calculators on his exams, but he'd generiously allow anyone to use a slide rule (assuming we could find them and learn how to operate them).

    --


    To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
    --E.C. Stanton
  3. A teacher you don't have to love... by PCM2 · · Score: 4, Interesting
    From TFA:
    "His fellow students were so proud of him and congratulatory. They thought it was really, really cool. They didn't call him a nerd or anything," said Michael Bolling, a school official in Chesterfield County.
    Damn, Mike, that's cold! Why don't you pick on somebody your own size, instead of a 12-year-old??
    --
    Breakfast served all day!