Activity Overview
In this activity, students will investigate the spiral formed by square roots of consecutive numbers, numerical approximations for square roots, the plot of the square root spiral arm lengths, and the graph of the square root function.
Before the Activity
Familiarity with the Pythagorean Theorem and function notation is needed.
During the Activity
This activity is designed to be student centered and requires minimal student experience with a
TI-Nspire handheld device. Having students record their findings on the Student Worksheet will
encourage engagement, retention, and mathematical communication. Anticipated timing for
the activity is one class period of 50 minutes.