I’m sure that you’re motivated to read Paolo Bacigalupi’s first novel, The Windup Girl, because it was named by TIME Magazine as one of the ten best novels of 2009, and also won the Hugo, Nebula, Locus, Compton Crook, and John W. Campbell… Read More ›
Teaching & Learning
New England Math Playoffs
Congratulations to the Weston High School Math Team for their strong showing in the New England Math Playoffs! We finished seventh among all the medium-sized high schools in New England. Special congratulations are due to sophomore William Kretschmer, who achieved… Read More ›
Radical Equations and related matters
A couple of years ago I got around to re-reading Radical Equations: Civil Rights from Mississippi to the Algebra Project, by civil-rights activist/math teacher Robert Moses. Just now I realized an interesting resonance with the post I wrote last week about… Read More ›
Everyone who wants to do so should be able to take honors-level courses…right?
Yesterday afternoon, one of my students was hanging out in the Math Office after school and started chatting with me and another teacher about a concern of hers: why was it so difficult to override a teacher’s recommendation and take… Read More ›
"Some of our students objectively can’t learn algebra."
No, of course I wasn’t the one who said that. It comes from a petition signed by 14 of Palo Alto High School’s 20 math teachers, listed by name (!) in a blog post by Dan Meyer, who is always… Read More ›
School is a 24/7 Job
Normally I don’t repost somebody else’s blog post in its entirety, but in this case… Mrs. Smith bitched to the Principal that little Alfie’s teachers never called when little Alfie wasn’t doing well in their classes. She didn’t know how… Read More ›
Predicting answers
Before you start solving a problem, predict what the answer will be. Not necessarily the exact answer; an estimate will do. One strategy that I like (but don’t use as often as I should) is to get students to do… Read More ›
21 things that will be obsolete by 2020…or will they?
Johns Hopkins professor Shelly Blake-Plock recently wrote an essay listing 21 things (in school) that will be obsolete by 2020. Will they really? Of course there were many doubters, including me. But before we get to the doubts, let’s look at… Read More ›
Strategies, techniques, and tricks
Why have I been surprised at the way that many teachers use the word “strategy”? And why does it bother me when teachers refer to “tricks”? Well, I’m glad you asked, so I’ll tell you why I believe that in… Read More ›
Jane Austen in Scarsdale: or Love, Death, and the SATs
This satirical novel is an irresistible book for anyone who lives or works in a town like Weston. (I know, the title says Scarsdale, but they’re close enough.) Paula Marantz Cohen has updated Jane Austen’s Persuasion by moving it 200… Read More ›
The distance formula
What are the pros and cons of teaching the distance formula? I can think of two of each: Pro #1: It’s useful and convenient. Pro #2: Future teachers may expect your students to know it. Con #1: It’s nothing but… Read More ›
Khan Academy revisited
Khan Academy used to be a good idea. Maybe it still is; I haven’t made anything like a thorough review of their hundreds of offerings, so it’s impossible for me to tell. But I’m skeptical. Before examining the reasons for… Read More ›
Teaching science through language
We like to claim that linguistics is a science, but I’ve never before seen any explicit discussion of using it to teach scientific principles. An intriguing abstract from Anne Lobeck suggests some possibilities along those lines, particularly pointing out that linguistics… Read More ›
Why asking questions might not be the best way to teach
Some years ago, one of my students asked me this question: “Why is it that whenever I ask you a question, you always respond by asking me a question?” I was tempted, of course, to say “Why do you think… Read More ›
Significant figures
Math teachers and science teachers never agree about significant figures — neither about their importance nor about how to use them. Math books and competitions tend to ignore the issue, or else they promulgate arbitrary rules, such as “answers must… Read More ›
“What Math Students Say”
How many times have you heard math students say these things? (She isn’t one of my students, but she certainly could be.)
Another math summer camp
You’re looking for a two-week math summer camp, aren’t you? Or perhaps you know an advanced student for whom this would be just the thing. While I don’t have any first-hand knowledge of the Mathematica Summer Camp, it does look… Read More ›
The Other Wes Moore
By this point you’ve probably heard of Wes Moore, as he has been making quite a splash in the mainstream media from NPR to Oprah. After hearing him on NPR, I just had to read his non-fiction memoir, The Other Wes… Read More ›
Levels vs. tracks
Adult friends often ask me about “tracking” at Weston. Apparently they’re referring to their own high school experiences, in which a student entered high school in a certain “track,” such as honors or business, and then remained there forever. This… Read More ›
The Square Root of Murder
Of course I wanted to like this book. What could be better than a mystery about a Massachusetts math teacher? But unfortunately this novel by Ada Madison (pen name of Camille Minichino) falls flat, IMHO at least. Apparently my opinion is… Read More ›
Learning Strategies 