Question about Unit 3 Chapter 1 Lesson 2

Hi! I have a question for clarification or suggestion for the future… In U3C1L2 students are expected to plot shapes. As a math teacher I am concerned or confused that the grid does not simulate the true first quadrant of the coordinate grid. Possibly there is a reason for that that I do not understand so I am hoping for clarification so I can better explain this to my students.

Thank you!

This is something that vexes every math teacher starting with this unit. The (0,0) coordinate is in the upper left corner and the numbers count up as they go down on the y axis because it was an industry standard from the start. It isn’t meant to be deliberately confusing, but it does mimic other coding platforms (not Scratch which puts (0,0) in the center). The nice part is that that students don’t have to deal with negative numbers. FYI… this answer was provided by a former language arts teacher who is totally unaffected by the placement of (0,0). :+1::smiley:

Thank you so much! I wonder why the ‘industry’ didn’t choose to simply place (0, 0) in the lower left… I appreciate your response and answer, however, I am still left a bit frustrated because they need to understand the true coordinate grid as well as the grid used in coding… I’m sure there is a greater reason and it may make sense sooner than later. Thank you!!

Hi, this generally reflects how documents on the web work. In English-speaking countries, we tend to start reading/looking at the top left and then move right and down, and elements on web pages are placed starting at the top and then moving down the screen, so the origin is at the top left of the screen, rather than the bottom left, reflecting our assumption that a document “starts” at the top.

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