Resources for Teaching Binary Numbers
I’ve been collecting resources for teaching Binary numbers and number systems lately. Today seemed like a good time to share what I have collected so far. And of course to ask people if they have others they recommend.
A lesson plan/activity for teaching Binary numbers from the MathamaniaCS web site. Includes a graphic on counting in Binary on ones fingers.
How to Count to 1,023 on Your Fingers
This site talks about base ten, base six, Binary, Binary Coded Decimal and Hexadecimal and includes a cute applet that demonstrates counting in those bases on your fingers. As always beware the Binary value for four.
Binary Counting Cartoon - https://www.instructables.com/id/Binary-Counting/
This cartoon (available as a downloadable PDF file) demonstrates how to count to over a thousand by using binary numbers and your fingers.
A guide to a quite confusing concept by Christine R. Wright with some help from Samuel A. Rebelsky. Written for college students and fairly comprehensive.
Cisco’s binary teaching game - https://forums.cisco.com/CertCom/game/binary_game_page.htm
This game challenges students to set and reset bits to display a binary representation of specific decimal numbers. It is an interactive way for students to practice what they know about binary numbers.
Exploring Binary blog - https://www.exploringbinary.com/
This blog is completely focused on binary numbering and data representation. It is written by Rick Regan who has a B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. in computer science.
Some outstanding sample posts are:
- How I Taught My Mother Binary Numbers - https://www.exploringbinary.com/how-i-taught-my-mother-binary-numbers/
- Converting Floating-Point Numbers to Binary Strings in C - https://www.exploringbinary.com/converting-floating-point-numbers-to-binary-strings-in-c/
- Ten Ways to Check if an Integer Is a Power Of Two in C - https://www.exploringbinary.com/ten-ways-to-check-if-an-integer-is-a-power-of-two-in-c/
- What Powers of Two Look Like Inside a Computer - https://www.exploringbinary.com/what-powers-of-two-look-like-inside-a-computer/
- A Twelve Cent Binary Calendar - https://www.exploringbinary.com/a-twelve-cent-binary-calendar/
The Binary Marble Adding Machine - https://woodgears.ca/marbleadd/index.html
This site shows a wooden binary adder that uses marbles to set and reset “bits.” There is a demo video and a link to plans for making a device yourself. Building one is recommended only for people who have experience with wood working but students will enjoy and learn from the video demo.
Converting from Binary to Decimal – https://www.mathwarehouse.com/non-decimal-bases/convert-binary-to-decimal.php
A very math centric set of examples of converting to and from decimal and binary numbers.
Why learn the Binary (Base2 ) number system? - https://web.fccj.edu/~wdennis/base/binary.htm
Part of a set of Base Number System information pages (https://web.fccj.edu/~wdennis/base/ ) by Bill Davis of Florida State College.
Alfred Thompson’s blog entries tagged with the Binary key word - https://blogs.msdn.com/alfredth/archive/tags/binary/default.aspx
From time to time new binary number educational resources are written up on this blog. Using the keyword Binary will list the most recent of them.
This post keeps getting hits so I thought I would add some more links I recieved via the contact form. (thanks
- Some online quizes on binary number conversions
- And online number converter from binary to hex and decimal and back.