The Research Experience for Teachers Program /
http://www.cs.appstate.edu/ret

Introduction/Motivation:

To understand set theory it can be useful to visually organize the data into a Venn diagram. Venn diagrams are a diagrammatic means of visualizing logical relationships between different sets of numbers, things or ideas.

Materials List: Computer with internet access to Scratch.mit.edu

Procedure:

Background:

The mathematical term for a group of numbers is a set, sometimes given by a capital u.

Union (U) means roughly to add.

Intersect (∩) means what two (or more) sets have in common.

Not (apostrophe on a set name i.e. A’) along with a set means “don’t include this set”

Preparation: Go to à https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/69975016/#player & press the green flag

Lab Activity:

1.  Press the Instruction button and the program will take you to an instructional page. Move the mouse over the expressions to the left for short explanation and then press and hold down the number key that it prompts you to for a visual representation of the expression.

2.  When finished, press the Practice button and the program will ask you questions about a number set. When typing in an answer be sure you type in only the number and no spaces, and then press Enter or click the check mark.

Assessment

3.  When you’re finished, click on “create” at the top of the page.

4.  Your task now is to create a program in Scratch with the following number set:

  1. U = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9}
  2. A = {1, 3, 5, 7}
  3. B = {1, 2, 3, 4, 5}

5.  The program should have the following:

  1. a Venn diagram
  2. the number set
  3. the numbers in the correct areas of the Venn diagram

6.  The program should do the following:

  1. Change color in the appropriate areas to display:
  2. AUB, A∩B, (AUB)’, and (A∩B)’

7.  Show your teacher to see if it is correct.