From: Paul Doherty (pauld@exploratorium.edu)
Date: Thu Jan 06 2005 - 09:18:16 PST
From: "Paul Doherty" <pauld@exploratorium.edu> Subject: Re: pinhole slide rules? Date: Thu, 06 Jan 2005 09:18:16 -0800 Message-ID: <web-8688245@exploratorium.edu>
I too love to find ways to teach about logarithms.
Here is an activity I developped called multiplication
blocks, it is a digital sliderule in diguise.
http://www.exo.net/~pauld/activities/mathematics/multiplicationblocks.htm
I also love the history of Napier. The "Fear of Murchison"
who while contemplating religion and mathematics in his
scottish castle came up with an idea that was so far out
that it could have come from Mars: the idea of the
logarithm.
Later this idea was used to create the slide rule. The
slide rule speeded up mathematics in the 17'th century as
much as the computer does today, it was a practical
mathematical revolution.
Napier also came up with Napiers Bones, which were later
replaced by having children memorize the times tables,
it's amazing to think that thrid graders today have
superior computing power to educated people in the 17'th
century because the memorize the times tables. (Napier's
bones are the times tables in stick form.)
While he was at it he also introduced the decimal form of
fractions.
I would like nto give a workshop on logarithms, including
the slide rule.
Paul Doherty
On Thu, 6 Jan 2005 09:14:08 -0800
"Coral Clark" <coralc@raft.net> wrote:
>I, personally, think that old technologies are
>fascinating and have a place
>in the classroom, if nothing else for the connection to
>human history of
>technology.
>I know that not everyone agrees with me, but I feel slide
>rules can be
>valuable tools that provide estimation practice. My
>chemistry teacher in
>high school took a lot of flack for making his students
>in the 80's use
>slide rules when calculators were readily available, but
>I actually
>appreciated the knowledge. They are also quite valuable,
>literally, as many
>people these days collect them.
>
>Here are a few links that give some history and show how
>to use them:
>
>http://www.sliderule.ca/intro.htm
>http://www.hpmuseum.org/sliderul.htm
>http://www.ualr.edu/~lasmoller/napier.html
>
>I have developed a simplified version of a slide rule
>that uses craft sticks
>with log templates. I can send the file to anyone who
>would like it (it is
>not yet on the RAFT website). We also have a craft stick
>version of Napier's
>Bones (an early lattice multiplication tool) that I can
>also send to anyone
>who is interested. For more information on Napier's
>Bones, go to:
>
> http://www.cee.hw.ac.uk/~greg/calculators/napier/great.html
>
>Cheers!
>
>-Coral
>
>I inherited a class set of slide rules and would like to
>know how to
>use them. Has anyone ever considered giving a Saturday
>workshop on old
>technologies that are cheaper, more environmentally
>friendly and
>develop thinking skills -- like the slide rule? If so,
>I'd be the
>first to sign up, I'd be happy to bring in my set of
>slide rules for
>people to work on (though I'd be taking them home again
>at the end of
>class) and I'd love to learn some other old technologies,
>too.
>
>Anyone else interested in this, or am I out of my mind?
>
>Ellen Koivisto
>SOTA, SF
>
>
>
>
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