Dana Stahl

DPUP Geometry Desmos

5/7/15
Reflection for Desmos Project

Half of my project was planned out. I really wanted to draw a violin, so I planned
to do that. But the designs on the outside of it I did not plan, and just experimented with
as I created them. I definitely used reflections of curves in my drawing. A violin is a very
symmetrical object, so I created parabolas that were easy to match. I used cubic and
linear lines on the bow that I created, but they dont look like it. They just look like
vertical lines because I used inequalities to cut them off. I consulted with many peers
about this project, most really understood what my artistic vision was, and enjoyed it.
Desmos has completely transformed the way that I think about function families. At first,
I understood how each function was written when looking at a graph. Basically, I could
write an equation based on a graph, but not graph the equation. This helped me to
visualize where each point should be, and how each point can affect the next. For
example, I was having a lot of trouble constructing my bow. I used a cubic equation, so it
created a curved line. But when I used the inequality, it cut off the curve. This ended up
perfect, since a bow isnt bent, but I still needed a cubic function. Another example of this
is when thinking about the radius in circles. When I first starting using desmos, I used the
slider to create all of the numbers. As I started using the slider for the radius, I saw how
the circle grew bigger and smaller. This helped me to understand the job of the radius.