Posts
May 22, 2013
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12:19 AM | All My Lessons
(and assessments). Yeah, it’s the end of my 2nd year of teaching Precalculus, Physics, and Chemistry, and I figure I should be able to post my lessons without too much shame. Actually, I am embarrassed of some things, because I’d like to … Continue reading →
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Suppose I gave you some red fingerpaint and asked you to make all the colors you could from this paint. You’d probably come up with a diverse collection of pinks, reds and burgendys – going through the range of reds … Continue reading →
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12:00 AM | On This Day in Math - May 22
The Le Petit Journal cover, on 1912 April 21, shows eclipse watchers in 1912 along with the solar eclipse of May 22, 1724, the previous total solar eclipse visible from Paris, France *Wik“Biographical history, as taught in our public schools, is still largely a history of boneheads:ridiculous kings and queens, paranoid political leaders, compulsive voyagers, ignorant generals - the flotsam and jetsam of historical currents. The men who radically altered history, the great
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May 21, 2013
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9:19 PM | Math Games with a Deck of Cards
Summer learning is so critical, especially for students who are already struggling. I've been working with a peer tutoring group this year (5th graders tutoring 3rd graders), and I wanted to give them a gift for completing the program. I bought each of the students a deck of cards, and my idea was to create a booklet to give them containing instructions for easy math games they could play using the cards. In scouring the Internet for ideas, I came across the website of an […]
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8:04 PM | Fraction Division via Rectangles
I appreciate Christopher Danielson's post on common numerator fraction division because it's important to examine how various algorithms work and how we can help our students become more flexible with their thinking. It's not surprising that I teach fraction division using rectangles, and I really believe the kids seem to grasp it better because it's visual. I'll start with this problem: 3/4 ÷ 2/3.But before we do fraction division, I ask kids about whole number
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8:00 PM | LaTeX for Assessments
Long story short: I wanted more ram but didn’t want to shell out $$$ for Windows 8. (Had 32-bit Windows 7.) Switched to Ubuntu (12.10 at the time) once I bought a 4GB ram stick (they’re cheap these days!!) Need … Continue reading →
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Crivello di Eratostene. Fonte: Wikimedia Commons.Il 17 aprile scorso arrivava nella casella di posta degli Annals of Mathematics un documento scritto da un matematico praticamente sconosciuto agli esperti nel suo campo, docente presso l'Università del New Hampshire di nome Yitang Zhang. Nel documento veniva indicato un importante progresso, addirittura una svolta, nella comprensione di uno dei più antichi problemi della matematica, la congettura dei numeri primi gemelli, proposta per la
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7:33 PM | SBG Idea: Final Exam Exchange
The Setting It’s the middle of exam week and mentally I’ve already moved on to next year. I am so ready to start SBG (Stanards Based Grading) that I’m actually a little sick and embarrassed of my finals this year. … Continue reading →
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It is then meaningful to ask whether a line could be simultaneously an area and a perimeter splitter, and seek a characterization of such lines if they exist. As a matter of fact, they do, and there may be 1, 2, or 3such lines. This was shown by A. Todd a senior at university. In truth, the problem has an interesting history.Area and Perimeter Splitters in a Triangle is a post from: CTK Insights
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6:27 PM | ELOGEREMMO SOLO SOMME REGOLE
Il bellissimo palindromo del titolo è servito a battezzare l’incontro che ho avuto a Roma il 15 maggio scorso con il suo autore, il matematico Marco Buratti, professore ordinario di Geometria presso l’Università di Perugia, esperto di Matematica Discreta. Buratti è autore di due libri di palindromi e da otto anni cura la rubrica “Né capo né coda” nel domenicale de Il Sole 24 Ore. L’occasione è stato l’invito rivolto a entrambi, da parte di Roberto Natalini di MaddMaths, di
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How I Rediscovered the Oldest Zero in History: Amir Aczel:
But who invented the zero, which gives so much power to our number system? We don’t know who invented it, but we are pretty sure that the zero is an Eastern invention. The oldest zero in India with a confirmed date is from the mid-ninth century, and found in the Chatur-bujha temple in the city of Gwalior.
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5:03 PM | What is algebra?
What is algebra?Didn’t we say in our algebra class that in the grades they study about numbers and so now they will be studying letters instead? Didn’t we say that in algebra we now use x instead of box (in 3 + ___ = 15, we now write 3 + x = 15) and since this announcement our [...]Original by Erlina Ronda
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4:30 PM | Follow-up to 50 billion app downloads
Previous post. So 50 billion apps downloaded on the iTunes store has come and gone, and I have nothing to show for it (except for a bunch of fun learning and some excitement for the next time). Things that happened: … Continue reading →
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This is the most math fun I've ever had. I went three years in a row, and then decided I had to branch out, and do something else with my summer. (I went to Maria Andersen's fabulous tech training that year.) I missed the Institute so much I found a way to go back the next summer. And I am now officially going this summer! I can't wait to meet all the new people who will be there. My buddy JD2718, for one.Why come?Math - There will be at least one problem you never saw before, I betcha.Very
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Il 15 maggio 2013, nei sotterranei del Dipartimento di Scienze dell’Ambiente e del Territorio e di Scienze della Terra dell’Università di Milano-Bicocca, è stato inaugurato il laboratorio EuroCold (European Cold Laboratory Facilities), uno tra i più grandi e moderni laboratori “freddi” ad atmosfera controllata, con l'obiettivo di studiare gli eventuali cambiamenti climatici conservando ed analizzando carote ghiacciate estratte da varie parti del globo. Il
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2:25 PM | Praying...
Though I've lived in Oklahoma my entire life, I don't think I'll ever get used to tornado season. For the past two days, I've watched news story after news story of the devastation that's just over an hour away from me. As a teacher, I can't imagine what it was like for those teachers and students to endure a tornado as it destroyed their school. I wonder what I would have done. I hope I never have to find out.I'm praying for the families whose lives have been forever […]
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We've been studying the explorers who searched the Pacific Coast for a Northwest Passage. A few highlights included:the NW Passage gamethe NW Passage song the trial of Francis Drakeletters to (and from) Queen ElizabethNW Passage timelines & book with Drake, Heceta, Cook, Gray, and Vancouver sailors and scurvy (aye, me sauerkraut!)the sea otter/fur trader gameWe culminated with Portfolders. Here are a few to share...As I receive parental permission to post photos I will add more, so check […]
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Schoenfeld divided his talk into three parts. 1. Students are currently not engaging in mathematical sense-making. He gave the example of the following problem posed to 97 first- and second-grade students. There are 26 sheep and 10 goats on a...
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1:26 PM | What is important?
I ask you this in all seriousness. What things do you really need to do your job to the best of your ability? I don’t mean pencils or markers (although for some of you this might be a fight) I mean what do you need? A supportive department? A quiet office? A home separate from your work or […]
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When it comes to functions, the concepts even and odd have always been important to me as a teacher. Connecting the algebraic and geoemtric representations of mathematical ideas is a primary goal in my classroom, and these concepts provide great opportunities to do that. Algebraically, a function is even if , and this condition manifests [...]
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The following conversation took place in my house the other day. Tabitha (6) had been informed by her mother that she (Tabitha) needed to eat something healthy before eating a chocolate-covered donut. I was—and remain—ignorant of the origins of this … Continue reading →
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[Dr. Chase guest blogging again] You’re probably familiar with Vi Hart’s math videos. Less well-known are her father’s math videos. Although I was aware of his mathematical sculpture, I was not aware until today that since August 2012, he has … Continue reading →
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10:16 AM | Calcolo di un volume
In questo periodo sto provando a preparare una quinta all'esame di stato. Il provare dipende essenzialmente dal fatto che la classe non sembra essere particolarmente interessata ad arrivare all'esame e sto arrivando alle minacce di insufficienze. A parte questi problemi, però, sto al momento affrontando il secondo problema del compito d'esame dello scorso anno, in particolare il quesito in cui viene richiesto il volume di un solido $W$. Data una regione $R$ del piano $xy$, base del solido $W$, […]
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9:00 AM | FP1 Complex Numbers quiz
The post FP1 Complex Numbers quiz appeared first on Flying Colours Maths.
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4:58 AM | 99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall
Berkeley Schools have a holiday today in honor of Malcom X’s Birthday and I promised my children we’re go visit dad at work. After decades of work as a computer engineer and nearly as many as a home-brewer, my husband … Continue reading →
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3:45 AM | Never Too Young To Build Tens
People are always amazed that somehow children learn math through play. This is because when they remember math there probably wasn't much play or fun associated with it. In fact a lot of people would rather not remember their math experiences at all because they often were so bad. How about you break this cycle with your kids and give them fun math experiences instead, and happy memories. Use math manipulatives and play and have some fun learning. The idea is to give them an algorithm to solve […]
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1:22 AM | Resource Alert: Greg Tang Math
Just a quick post tonight to share a wonderful resource with you. You are probably familiar with the name Greg Tang from his best-selling math books, most notably The Grapes of Math. Or you might have seen him speak, as I have, at any one of a number of national conferences.
So how exciting is it that he is now making all of his resources available for FREE on his new website. This is a great resource, so head over there and explore!
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Noteworthy: The kids have a ton of confidence, even in the stuff that they haven’t formally studied in class yet. (For this survey, Questions 1-3 had been covered formally, and Questions 4-5 had not.) To my mind, this continues to reaffirm that the most annoying mistakes aren’t the distortion of instruction; they’re the failure of… Continue reading →
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12:25 AM | Graph Shop - A Thrift Shop Parody
Hey everybody! I made a music video with some of my current and former students about graphing lines using slope and y-intercept. So here it is! Lyrics are below.Schooltube version coming soon.You can download the audio here.I'm gonna graph some linesGotta get em in slope intercept formHit that y axisPut the intercept onThen use rise over runWalk up to the class like, "What up, class is in session" I'm so pumped about today's sick math lessonGraph on the
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12:00 AM | On This Day in Math - May 21
Whoever ... proves his pointand demonstrates the prime truth geometricallyshould be believed by all the world,for there we are captured~Albrecht DurerThe 141st day of the year; 141 is the first non-trivial palindrome appearing in the decimal expansion of Pi, appearing immediately after the decimal point, 3.14159. Tanya Khovanova, Number Gossip EVENTS1819 the first bicycle in the U.S. was seen in New York City. Such bicycle velocipedes or "swift walkers" had been imported that same year. […]
