Re: LOGO-L> Total Turtle Trip

[George Mills <mills@softronix.com>]

I think we are juggling between many things:

1) The "best" way for a non Ideal computer to draw a circle.

2) The "best" way for a Ideal computer to draw a circle.

3) The "best" way to explain what a circle is to a student
   (which depends on the level of the student)

4) The "best" in terms of ease to get what looks like a circle
   in logo.

5) The "best" way to draw a circle in terms of performance.

6) The "best" way to draw a circle may not be the same for
   all levels of students.

7) The "best" way to draw a circle in terms of accuracy.

If you think about Chucks method it works just like a
compass which is very easy to explain with out even getting
into PI (which a student might not be ready for yet).

But for a quick way to draw a circle based on previous basics
of drawing a square, certainly POLY is easy to draw what looks
like circle. But you have to get into much more complex math
to explain why it draws an approximate circle (like PI, limits
and the work involved in getting it to be a function of radius).
Certianly valid things to cover at the appropriate level.

-- 
===============================================================
George Mills
email: mills@softronix.com
http://www.softronix.com
The www page contains some very powerful educational software.
Our single most important investment is our kids.
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