Recent Posts - page 116

  • Prince of Thieves

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    I just finished listening to the audiobook version of Prince of Thieves, a crime thriller written by Chuck Hogan and read by Dorchester’s own Donnie Wahlberg. The action takes place in Charlestown, and the sense of place is definitely the… Read More ›

  • Urban schools success stories? Or not?

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    So here’s the question. Why does everyone like to hear success stories from inner-city, overwhelming minority public schools? I suppose Democrats like to hear these stories because it confirms their beliefs that non-whites without money can be academically successful, and… Read More ›

  • Geoffrey Chaucer Hath a Blog

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    How could I resist reading a blog entitled “Geoffrey Chaucer Hath a Blog”? Yes, as you guessed, it turns out to be a blog that’s entirely written in Middle English! Anyway, take a look at it and make a serious… Read More ›

  • The Coffee Trader

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    I recently finished reading a fascinating historical novel by David Liss, The Coffee Trader. Now maybe you’re not interested in the formation of the coffee trade in Europe in the 17th Century — though I can’t imagine why not —… Read More ›

  • Big ideas

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    LCSI’s new blog, Thinkering, links to Seymour Papert’s homepage, which in turn links to a four-and-a-half-year-old press release from MIT, which reminded me of our commitment to big ideas in the Math Department of the Weston Public Schools. Such are… Read More ›

  • The Mexican Consulate puzzle (and cell phone cameras)

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    Ate lunch today at the Blue Fin, a favorite inexpensive Japanese restaurant in Little Tokyo, a.k.a. the Porter Exchange Building in Cambridge. A new sign lists the types of identification that are acceptable for ordering alcoholic beverages — mostly the… Read More ›

  • Dorchester: 1630-1870

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    It often happens that an event at the Dorchester Historical Society (DHS) is an informative experience. And it often happens that a DHS event is an enjoyable experience. Today’s presentation by Earl Taylor and John Goff was both. The title… Read More ›

  • WoW and Second Life: follow-up

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    This is a follow-up to my earlier post on Second Life (SL) vs. World of Warcraft (WoW). One of my students, Dan Spector, replies to that post by writing the following remarks in an email message to me (quoted by… Read More ›

  • Modified open campus — a solution to tardiness, or would it make it worse?

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    We have a problem at Weston High School. Actually, we have more than one — but there’s one problem I want to write about here: every day we have an extraordinary number of students coming late to school and/or late… Read More ›

  • High-school dropout = criminal?

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    Last night, Emily Rooney’s Greater Boston included a segment on truancy in the Boston public schools. One of her guests, Suffolk County Sheriff Andrea Cabral, whom I usually admire and respect, claimed that 50% of high-school dropouts (from Boston public… Read More ›

  • Unlucky in Law

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    I have a mixed reaction to Unlucky in Law, by Perri O’Shaughnessy. It’s a decent enough legal mystery, more-or-less in the John Grisham or Scott Turow vein. And it has an undeniably interesting plot, involving the Russian-American community in Monterey…. Read More ›

  • Irrationality

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    Rudbeckia Hirta reports that her college students have trouble understanding irrational numbers: Most of my students felt that 3 * sqrt(2) / 5 * sqrt(2) was irrational because of the sqrt(2). They didn’t remember that you can “cancel” (hate that… Read More ›

  • An AP course makes the resume shine

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    As in a great many other high schools, Weston sees more and more students each year taking Advanced Placement courses. Why is this happening? And is it a good thing? It’s easy to see why it’s happening. Weston students are… Read More ›

  • Maths

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    It’s helpful to read what the Brits say about maths teaching. I’ve recently started reading Mathematics in School, a journal published by the Mathematical Association (MA), which is more or less the British equivalent of our National Council of Teachers… Read More ›

  • Overheard in Dorchester

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    So I’m waiting in line at the deli section of the Stop & Shop at 545 Freeport St. in Dorchester, and the customer in front of me asks the clerk a question: Customer: Where are we? Clerk [in a surprised… Read More ›

  • "worksheet for students: am i insane?"

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    The aforementioned Jill Walker has posted a fascinating article entitled “worksheet for students: am i insane?” No, she’s not insane, although some of my students think she’s misguided. But I think she’s on to something. Take a good look at… Read More ›

  • Fractal dimension retraction or converse error?

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    As Ivars Peterson and others have pointed out, Jackson Pollock’s paintings can be analyzed mathematically as fractals, and they turn out to have a distinctive fractal dimension. As various articles have pointed out, inauthentic (forged) Pollocks have incorrect fractal dimensions…. Read More ›

  • Second Life or WoW?

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    Would I be interested in joining a 3-D virtual world in my copious free time, which doesn’t really exist? Some of my students have been trying to persuade me to play World of Warcraft (Wow). (That was the standard acronym,… Read More ›

  • St. Alban's Fire

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    Archer Mayor’s well-crafted series of police procedurals has a highly deserved reputation for strong and careful plotting. As a Vermonter, Mayor writes in a style that convincingly evokes the state of Vermont — as much so as Lawrence Block evokes… Read More ›

  • Happy numbers, unhappy families

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    One of my students came across the Wikipedia article on Happy Numbers and asked about it in precalculus class. This is the sort of topic for which Wikipedia is an excellent source; in fact, if I wanted to know about… Read More ›