Recent Posts - page 104

  • Studs Terkel's Working

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    This year’s spring musical at Weston High School is the little-known Working, based closely on Studs Terkel’s great book of the same name. Although I say “closely,” the musical can of course include only a tiny fraction of the chapters… Read More ›

  • The Seventh Annual Fractal Fair

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    Seven is a lucky number, so no one was surprised that the seventh annual Fractal Fair at Weston High School turned out to be the best one so far. Of course there were many great exhibits in each of the previous fairs, but… Read More ›

  • Get over It

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    What do you do on a snow day? Watch a movie, of course. Get over It had been on my shelf for awhile, since I had ordered it from Netflix shortly after seeing Midsummer Night’s Dream at Weston High School… Read More ›

  • Careless in Red

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    Elizabeth George has long been one of my favorite authors, but her books have been becoming bleaker and bleaker. Even though I’ve read many — most? even all? — of her novels, I don’t think I’ve ever reviewed any of… Read More ›

  • Birthday/Sel de la Terre

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    Over the past few weeks, a number of my sophomores have been trying to figure out my birthday. All they knew was that it was somewhere in February. Even though I had told them that one of my students (now… Read More ›

  • Parental communication

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    Here is a strange note that I received from a parent of a 16-year-old student [names changed to protect, etc., etc.]: Mr. Davidson — Jimmy had trouble with the math project and would like to email you as soon as… Read More ›

  • Predictably Irrational

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    I generally find that non-fiction works are difficult to follow in the audiobook format. Perhaps it’s because non-fiction books remind the reader of college lectures, so there’s an impulse to take notes. Perhaps it’s because they tend to be dryer… Read More ›

  • Special K, a.k.a. sugar

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    While I suppose this probably isn’t news to anyone else, it was to me. Yesterday Barbara picked up a granola bar labeled Kellogg’s® Special K Bliss™. Note that Special K comes with “a variety of delicious options to kick-start a… Read More ›

  • Cries and Whiskers

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    Generally I stay away from mysteries that feature cats. They tend to be too cute, with anthropomorphized felines that solve crimes or even talk. But Clea Simon’s Cries and Whiskers avoids those pitfalls. Aside from featuring cats, this novel also… Read More ›

  • 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 ›