NASA space math problems

I forgot about NASA space math problems until I got one of their regular updates in my e-mail this morning.  The latest problem is Problem 607: The Launch of LADEE to the Moon.
The description is :
Students plot the altitude, range and speed of the LADEE rocket launch and investigate rates of change including acceleration by graphing the tabular data and determining the slope of the graph using the definition of the slope of a line between two points.
This is a wonderful example of rate of change in a real situation where students can try it themselves.  The material NASA offers covers grades 6 to 12 and has all the past problems available for use along with some other items such as a space math book for grades 6 to 8 which is a standards based with multi-media math resources. 
The information is in PDF form so I can bring it into an app like subtext to interject questions, tags, activities, etc.  Most will require use of a calculator/graphing app, a drawing or note app and they could place their answers into a QR code to turn in.  Hmmmm the possibilities.

update on myscript calculator

I did a bit of reading on the web and tried it out a bit more and discovered a couple things about it.
1.  You can write an equation like 2x ? + 1 =9 and it will write 2 x  4 + 1 = 8.  It will actually solve the problem.
2.  If you do 2 x 3 = 5, it will give you the answer 2 x 3 = 5  + 1  so it takes your answer and tells you how far off it is.
3.  Since it only does nth roots by using the fractional form of the radical signs, this means that students get more practice on converting radicals into fractional exponents.  I like this because too many of my students have trouble with the connection.
Finally, the student I let try it out for some work, loved it. 
I am going to continue exploring it this summer but I think I will put it n the iPads in the fall.

I showed the subtext app to the principal who used to be the science teacher.  His first comment out was that you could set up a whole week doing this type of app.  He was impressed.
So I have 3 to 5 apps that I will be working on over the summer to prepare for the fall.  I will be sharing things as I set them up.

One last thing.  My 9th graders love using the Venn diagrams to find LCM and GCF  because it allows them to see the relationship between the two.  I am going to see about creating a document that I can use with subtext or with the students that they can fill out for themselves.

Gem of a free calculator app

Last night I stumbled across a neat little calculator program that so far is great for many HS math classes.  It can also be used at the lower levels.  Most calculator apps mimic a real calculator with the buttons, clear, memory, etc but this one does not.  My Script calculator is quite different. You write the problem out with your finger and it transforms it into print and gives you an answer.  It does ln, log base something, nth roots using the exponential form of the radical.  It even recognizes pi and changes it to 3.14 for calculations of volume or area.  I discovered it does sin, cos, and tan using either degrees or rads automatically.
The only down side I have found but I am planning on checking with the company that makes the app is that it gives answers to all problems in decimal form, even fractions.  Other than that I love it and I think it is faster for the students to use as they are not hunting for various keys.
I showed it to the sped dept and the lady in charge loved it.
Has anyone used this particular app? How do you like it?