I have owned numerous calculators by HP, TI, Sharp, Casio, etc., but this new Classpad 300 Plus that was just released a few weeks ago with Casio's latest operating system (OS 3.0) and Classpad Manager 3.0 is just fabulous. It is now in common use in Europe, especially in Germany and also in Australia and in New Zealand. If you purchase(d) the version with OS 2.0, you can still upgrade electronically to the newest version using the Classpad Manager Version 3.0 directly which has a number of very nice new features/functions. This calculator should also be in common use in the USA as well, but regrettably the financial dominance of TI in our marketplace (and the impending arrival of the new TI NSpire calculator) make the likelihood of its acceptance very soon quite small, unless people like myself write reviews like this to promote educators to really get involved with this new product. The real advantage of both the Classpad as well as the TI NSpire calculator (which is not a pen-based product like the Classpad) is the great software that installs on PC's so that a complete emulation of its operations is possible even without the calculator being physically available. It addition, however the Casio (OS 3.0) will do now do Dirac Delta functions, Heaviside Step functions, Fourier and Laplace Transforms (including Fast Fourier Transforms, i.e., FFT's), First order ordinary differential equations, financial analyses, and of course it already performed complex number analyses, etc.
The operating feature on the Classpad that appeals to me the most however is the pen-based drag and drop operations using the Computer Algebra System (CAS) and the interactive menu between each of the numerous types of submenus on the device. Any operation worked on in one area (Graphs and Tables for example) can readily be copied and pasted into another area (Statistics, Spreadsheets, Sequences, etc) just to name a few of the numerous possibilities. The E-activity submenu on the Casio supports presentations to an audience and is the analog for the Classpad of the TI NSpire's 4 screens of information that can all be put on to a single screen at once (analyzing a problem using a geometrical representation in the form of a drawing or a picture, a word statement of the problem, an analytic or numerical equation solution and a graph of the results). Finally, the results can all be ported back and forth and printed/stored, etc. between the Classpad Manager software/emulator and the calculator itself which is simply fantastic to use. I have had this for almost a month now and I am just begining to appreciate what it can do for me daily in my work as a scientist. If students get exposed to these devices in a late middle school curriculum and beyond (after they first master many of the basics of mathematics and science), in my opinion they will want to continue to grow into math and science in their later years and become excited leaders in science and engineering that this country has been famous for having for most of the last 60 years.Get more detail about Touch-Screen Graphing Calculator.
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