US1498121A - Educational appliance - Google Patents

Description

`:ateritee:l June 17, 1924).

UNITED STATES HUBERT RIECK, OFIRVINGTON, NEW JERSEY.

EDUCATIONAL APPLIANCE.

Application filed November 2, 1923.` Serial No. 672,242.

To all lwhom t may concern.'

Be it known that I, HUBERT Rincir, a citizen of the United States, and a resident of Irvington, county of EsseX, and State of New Jersey, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Educational Appliances, of which the following is a speciication.

This invention relates to an educational l0 appliance for primary grades, the device being adapted to present the rudiments of mathematics in a manner other than abstract, in other words, to give a graphic but` simple demonstration of addition and subtraction, multiplication and division. This device is also amusing and interesting as well as instructive and thereby instills more interest in the childs mind in simple matheinatical problems.

In my appliance I employ a device used in the manner of an abacus but with guiding or instructing marks used in conjunction with the counters on the wires, on which they slide. The appliance can be made up as an article for such use only, but I prefer to make it mounted on a frame containing a pencil box, the partition between the receptacle for pencils and the chamber for the wires and counters, acting as a bottom cominon to both of them.

The invention is illustrated in the accompanying drawings in which Figure 1 is a perspective view partly broken away of an article comprising a pencil box and my new appliance. Figure 2 is a top view of the device shown in Figure 1 with the cover removed. Figure 3 is a section taken on ay plane indicated by the line 3--3 in Figure 2. Figure 4 is a partial section taken on line 4 4 in Figure 2.

The device comprises a box-like frame consisting of the sides 10 and the ends 11 and has a partition 12 which forms a bottom for the chamber 13 in which are mounted the transverse parallel wires 14. To provide a cheap construction, I mount the wires by forcing their ends in narrow slits or sawcuts 15 in strips 16'glued or otherwise fastened against the sides 10. On each wire is a counter 17 which slides freely on its wire.

Suitably disposed on the upper face of the bottom 12 are markers 18 which markers can be printed on the upper face of said bottom or can be indicated by recesses as shown in the drawing. These markers are preferably grouped to indicate various values y'and I show in Figure 2, the groups that indicate increasing values showing one at a, two at Z2, three at 0, four at d and live at e.

`With this arrangement I prefer to arrange the wires and their counters in two groups of ten divided by a transverse partition 19.

In addition, I arrange markers as at 20 to include the total number of counters. Iith this arrangement, a pupil can be taught to count successively from one to ten in a physical way, having an optical demonstration of the increasing values as the ymarkers are covered or decreasing values as they are uncovered, to avoid the diiliculty of an abstract of theoretical explanation.

The use of the counters with the markers will be evident particularly to one trained in education. A suitable lid 21 can be arranged to cover the device when it is not in use. I prefer to place the partition 12 approximately central in thefraine so that the receptacle 22 is formed beneath it, the partition thus forming a bottom common to both October, 1923.

HUBERT RIECK.

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