After 40 Years, Calculators in School Still Add Up to Debate
40年后，在学校使用计算器仍有争议
This is the VOA Special English Education Report.
Can you do the math: What is one hundred times four, divided by the square root of a hundred? If you know that, then you know the answer to this: How many years ago did three scientists at Texas Instruments invent the handheld electronic calculator?
The answer is forty. The scientists were Jerry Merryman, James Van Tassel and Jack Kilby. Their first device could add, subtract, multiply and divide. It had twelve bytes of memory—close to nothing compared to today's powerful calculators. And it weighed more than a kilogram.
But it was powered by batteries. That meant it could be taken anywhere. Other electronic calculators had to be plugged into electricity. Not only that, they weighed close to twenty-five kilograms and were almost as big as typewriters.
In the United States, the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics says teachers at every level should support the use of calculators. Students are even permitted to use them when they take college entrance tests. That may surprise parents who still think of the days of paper-and-pencil only.
Yet after forty years, calculators in the classroom still add up to the same old debate.
Some education experts think calculators are used too much. Children, they say, learn to depend on these electronic brains instead of their own. Calculators may not only give students answers to questions they do not really understand, critics argue. They may also keep them from discovering ideas for themselves. The danger? Students who cannot even do simple addition and subtraction.
Other experts, though, say calculators have helped make mathematics more understandable to more students. They say calculators give students more time to understand and solve problems——and to develop a better sense of what numbers mean. That way, the reasoning goes, they can study higher level ideas than they would otherwise. And they can feel better about their abilities.
What do teachers think? Generally they say calculators can be useful -- especially with more complex math. But they also say that young students should know basic operations before they begin using them.
What do you think of calculators in the classroom? Send your thoughts to special@voanews.com. Tell us about your own experience. And be sure to include your name and where you are from.
And that's the VOA Special English Education Report, written by Nancy Steinbach. Our reports are online at voaspecialenglish.com. I'm Steve Ember.
40年后，在学校使用计算器仍有争议
这里是VOA特别英语教育报道。
你能做这道数学题吗？100乘4除以100的平方根等于几？如果你知道，那么你就知道这问题的答案：多少年以前，3 位科学家在得克萨斯仪器研究室发明手提式电子计算器？
这道题的答案是40。科学家是杰瑞•迈睿门，詹姆斯•太舍以及杰克•基尔比。他们的第一台机器能够加减乘除运算。它有12字节的记忆功能——与现在功能强大的计算器相比简直不值一提，并且它重达一千克以上。
但它用电池作动力。那意味着它可以能被带任何地方。其他电子计算机必须被插进电源。不仅如此，他们的重量接近25公斤而且几乎大如打字机。
在美国，全国数学教师协会说，教师在每个层次应该支持使用计算器。学生甚至参加大学入学考试都允许使用计算器。仍然以为当天只用纸和铅笔的家长可能惊咤不已。
在四十年以后, 计算器在教室里使用仍同从前一样争议依旧。
一些教育专家认为计算器被使用的过多。他们说，孩子们的学习依赖这些电脑而不是他们自己的大脑。计算器不仅可能给学生并没有真正理解的问题的答案，批评者说，还可能抑制他们自己的创造性思维。危险吗？学生甚至不会做简单的加减法。
不过，其他专家说计算器对更多的学生来说使数学变得更好理解了。他们说计算器给学生更多的时间理解并且解决问题——从而更好地开发对数字含义的思维能力。那种方式，其推论：比其他方法，他们能够学会更高层次思维能力。并且他们更能感受他们的能力。
教师是什么看法？通常他们说计算器可能有用——特别是用于较复杂的数学。但是他们也说小学生开始使用计算器之前应该懂得基本运算。
你如何看待在课堂使用计算器？把你的看法发送到special@voanews.com。把你们自己的体验告诉我们。并且一定包括你的名字和你的所在地。
以上VOA特别英语教育报道，由南希·斯坦芭撰稿。我们的系列报道登在网站voaspecialenglish.com 上。我是史蒂夫·安贝。