Questions and Answers

7/11/08
Question: I was wondering what your preference was when we have to use pi.  Should we use 22/7, 3.14, or just hit the pi button on our calculators?  Some teachers have a certain one they want their students to use, and I just want to make sure I can do just that. 

Answer:  I usually work the problems in terms of pi and don't approximate it until the very end, if necessary.  If rounding a decimal is appropriate for the problem, then I usually use the pi-button on the calculator and round the decimal to the appropriate number of places for the answer.  This provides the most accurate approximation.  In general, I don't really care how you choose to approximate pi as long as you can tell if your answer is correct
at the end of the problem.

7/7/08
Question:  In the rubric it says that we need to show work for all the
 problems. However Numbers 3,4 and 5 all you had to do is decide on a
property. Do I need to show any work for these problems and if so what
 would I show?

Answer:  For these three problems about the properties, you could just write a simple description of how you identified the property.  For example, if the problem is 8x1=8, you can say it's the Multiplicative Identity because multiplying by 1 makes the same value that you started with.  Something basic like that to support your answer is what I would expect. 

 

Question:  How would we show work for the first two questions?

Answer:  Your 2 rubric points for the first two problems will be earned, 1 if they are in the right order and 1 if they are classified correctly.  All of this information can be shown in the grid provided on the answer document.  The only supporting work you might include would be the decimal comparisons you use to order the numbers properly.