Category: Wolfram Alpha

10 Basic Computations You can Do with Wolfram Alpha

High School Mathematics, Software Tutorials, Wolfram Alpha

In the previous post, I have shared to you the advantages of using Wolfram Alpha. In this post, I am going to list some of the basic calculations that can be done using the same app. Note that you can use these commands both in the iOS version or the web version.

1. Do Basic Arithmetic with Integers, Fractions, and Decimals

150 + 32
1200 – 3
15.8 * 2.5
15/5
1/5*(3 – 8)

2. Compute Decimal Approximation to a Specified Number of Digits

pi to 1000 digits
e to 50 digits  » Read more

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Some thoughts on using Wolfram Alpha in teaching math

Wolfram Alpha

My main work at our institute is to find ways on how to integrate technologyparticularly free software and Web 2.0 applications in teaching mathematics. Recently, I have been thinking of integrating Wolfram Alpha in teacher trainings, but I can’t yet  justify to myself why (I don’t want to read the work of others yet).

Don’t get me wrong. Wolfram Alpha is a great tool — the first of its kind. You type your query and voila, all the related information pop up — graphs, numbers, tables, maps,  and almost all the things that you need. Fantastic, but if a lesson ends in generating information from Wolfram Alpha, then it’s no different from using Google or Wikipedia — well a little different probably because of the presentation.  I don’t want to let students use Wolfram Alpha just to get information; I want it to be a tool that would elicit thinking. » Read more

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Building widgets with Wolfram Alpha

High School Mathematics, Teaching Tools, Web 2.0 Technology, Wolfram Alpha

We have talked about why Wolfram Alpha and why is it so special.  Yesterday, I tried exploring widgets and came across with this video on how to build widgets using Wolfram Alpha.

Once you have created a widget, you can embed it on your websites.  The widget below is the first widget I created. Try typing the equations and click the Submit button to see the results.

[wolframalphawidget id=”93fbe03d0e7b762d188a63f89bc1b75f”]

You are probably wondering about the unwanted lines on the widget, but I think it’s in the format of the WordPress template. Here’s how should it look like in a Blospot blog. I haven’t tried embedding it using other templates.

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