Recent Posts - page 103

  • Everything is Miscellaneous

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    For years now I’ve been fascinated and bothered by hierarchical systems of organization, starting with the Dewey Decimal System and progressing to typical org charts in businesses and hierarchical file systems on computers. On the one hand, the systematic structure… Read More ›

  • Playing suburban patty cake

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    Catching up on a blog written by fellow Dorchester resident Candelaria Silva, I came across a post from a year and a half ago, “All White People, All the Time,” which caught my eye for several reasons: first of all,… Read More ›

  • Dollhouse

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    Thanks to the wonders of Tivo, Barbara and I were able to watch the opening episode of Dollhouse, “Ghost”, a few days late. It turned out to be part fun and part obligation — fun because it’s Joss Whedon, and… Read More ›

  • The Numbers Behind Numb3rs

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    My students sometimes ask me whether the mathematics in the television show Numb3rs is real. This question, among others, is explored in a fascinating book, The Numbers behind Numb3rs: Solving Crime with Mathematics, by mathematicians Keith Devlin and Gary Lorden…. Read More ›

  • Computational intractability

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    It’s been a stressful week here in Lake Wobegon, but February break is finally almost upon us; now I have a chance to catch up on things from the past few days. Of course it’s always nice to see the… Read More ›

  • The two Chows

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    No, not two dogs. No, not two students whose last name is Chow. I’m referring to two Chinese restaurants: Chau Chow in Dorchester (discussed previously in this blog on 7/23/2008, 9/1/2006, and 5/9/2006) and Great Chow in the Wollaston section… Read More ›

  • Dump “No Child Left Behind” Completely?

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    Yes, dump NCLB completely. But first read Brian Harvey’s brief article in the Blue Sky: New Ideas for the Obama Administration publication out of the UC Berkeley Law School. He’s right, of course.

  • People of the Book

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    Like some of the other novels I tend to read, People of the Book appeals to a particular type of audience rather than the general public. Australian author Geraldine Brooks’s fascinating historical novel spans many centuries while remaining firmly anchored… Read More ›

  • This isn't school!

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    The time is 8:30 this morning. The scene is the front of Greenleaf Hall at Milton Academy, as the day begins at The Saturday Course. A mom drops off her fourth-grader. We listen in on their remarks: Mom: Have a… Read More ›

  • Cellphones: A cautionary tale

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    During yesterday’s Massachusetts Math League meet in Westford, a cell phone belonging to a student from a nearby high school (neither Weston nor Westford) emitted a tone during the first round. She pulled the phone out of her pocket, looked… Read More ›

  • Interactive whiteboards

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    Yesterday was an “abbreviated Wednesday” at Weston High School, since the afternoon was devoted to a Professional Development Day for teachers. We focused on the subject of interactive whiteboards (IWBs); many of our classrooms have recently been equipped with either… Read More ›

  • The Stranger House

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    Here is yet another genre-transcending novel that’s something of a gothic mystery but really is neither gothic nor mystery: The Stranger House, by Reginald Hill. It helps, of course, that the protagonist this time is a mathematician — even better… Read More ›

  • The Lake of Dead Languages

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    I recently listened to the audiobook version of The Lake of Dead Languages, a fascinating novel by Carol Goodman. Well, actually, I don’t know how fascinating it would be to the general reader, but it resonated for me in so… Read More ›

  • The Strontium-90 Scenario

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    In all six sections of college-prep Algebra II (taught by three teachers, with two sections apiece), we have just completed a project in which each student has to understand a scenario (written by one of my colleagues), complete some mathematics… Read More ›

  • I haven't seen any of these movies.

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    One of my sophomores is appalled at the list of movies that I haven’t seen. Whenever she mentions one or another of her favorite movies, it almost always happens that I haven’t seen it. So she gave me an assignment… Read More ›

  • Not thinking of YouTube

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    We’re studying some 20th-Century mathematics in Precalculus class these days. This situation is unusual in high-school math, where most of what we study goes back at least 300 years, not to mention 2300 in the case of most of our… Read More ›

  • What's wrong with a 92?

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    This story is completely true; only the names have been changed to…, etc., etc. So I’m handing back a test this morning, using my new system where the grade is written on the bottom of the last page rather than… Read More ›

  • National Heritage Museum

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    Barbara and I, along with my sister Ellen, spent the afternoon today at the National Heritage Museum in Lexington. There are two exhibits there that I can enthusiastically recommend, so go see them while you can! The first is entitled… Read More ›

  • The Global Achievement Gap

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    Think about this: The most important skill in the New World of work, learning, and citizenship today — the rigor that matters most — is the ability to ask the right questions. Old World rigor is still about having the… Read More ›

  • Take it easy, but take it.

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    It’s a cliché to say so, but this was certainly a day that I’ll remember for the rest of my life! Unlike most such days (the JFK assassination, 9/11, etc.) it was historic as a joyous occasion, not a tragedy…. Read More ›