ABSTRACT
It is the day before Easter break, and an Algebra I teacher comes up and asks for the Moptown (The Learning Company; Menlo Park, CA; $39.95) disk. She wants to take her class to the computer room for a pre-vacation activity. As a strong proponent of using software in the math classroom, I felt obligated to honor the request. The students went into the computer lab and had a nice experience. However, I cannot help but feel frustrated knowing that, for the most part, this is the extent of software usage in the math classroom. Don’t get me wrong, Moptown is an excellent piece of software for teaching deductive reasoning and sequential logic. But this scenario typifies the current situation in mathematics. Software is used as an “add on” to the curriculum rather than serving as an integral part in the teaching of mathematics.
