Learning Strategies

Recent Posts - page 42

• Tavolo!

  By ljd42 on November 25, 2020

  

  Barbara and I had yummy take-out yesterday from Tavolo (at least two dinners’ worth for the two of us): pan seared duck breast with smashed 12 moon farm pumpkin, grilled asparagus, cinnamon, vincoto; house meatballs with marinara and parmesan; shrimp… Read More ›

• A number of galactic proportions

  By ljd42 on November 24, 2020

  

  Take, say, 73 little cubes (blocks or ordinary D6 dice). Could you arrange them into three perfect cubes? I’ll wait while you try to solve this problem… OK, you probably started by taking 64 of them to make a 4×4×4… Read More ›

• Ivy is a Weed

  By ljd42 on November 22, 2020

  

  Any good academic mystery is always a  treat. Robert M. Roseth’s Ivy is a Weed is a good academic mystery. The story takes place at a thinly disguised University of Washington, Seattle campus. For the most part it’s a spot-on satire of bureaucratic… Read More ›

• Sorry, but we’re just not going to be able to get rid of the Electoral College.

  By ljd42 on November 20, 2020

  

  Finally the American people have woken up and understand the Electoral College (EC), or at least its importance. Well, at least somewhat. My Quantitative Reasoning (QR) students at the Crimson Summer Academy (CSA) certainly understand it: how many electors each… Read More ›

• Pronounce bruschetta, schism, and schedule. Go ahead. I’ll wait.

  By ljd42 on November 18, 2020

  

  No, the “sch” in bruschetta is not pronounced like the English “sh”! It’s pronounced like the English “sk.” Bruschetta is an Italian word, not a German word, so don’t pronounce it as in Schadenfreude, to quote James Harbeck in the link below. Actually, the issue is slightly more… Read More ›

• My ethnicity puzzle. Any ideas?

  By ljd42 on November 17, 2020

  

  Can you help me solve my ethnicity puzzle? You might have some ideas, especially if you yourself have Ashkenazi heritage. Ancestry sent me this information about my paternal grandfather (from the 1910 Federal census). Does everything look right to you?… Read More ›

• Is this the life of a typical college freshman during the pandemic?

  By ljd42 on November 16, 2020

  

  Even without actually doing anything, I’m exhausted just from watching this four-minute video! This is definitely not the life of a typical college freshman as portrayed in the media. So the question remains: how many freshmen — excuse me, “first-years” — are… Read More ›

• Grey elections

  By ljd42 on November 15, 2020

  

  Who cares about the mathematics of elections? We all should, of course — especially now. An informative, even entertaining way to learn about this topic is to watch the videos of CGP Grey. For a scary example, take a look… Read More ›

• A Broken Hallelujah: Rock and Roll, Redemption, and the Life of Leonard Cohen

  By ljd42 on November 14, 2020

  

  What did Alex Trebek and Leonard Cohen have in common? “Both were Canadians,” you reply. “Both were beloved by huge audiences,” you add. Yes, of course. And both get the title of Rabbi, according to Mark Oppenheimer, cohost of the… Read More ›

• What I’ve learned in the past hour

  By ljd42 on November 12, 2020

  

  I just learned (a bit) about the Zettelkasten Method! You probably already know about it, but I had never heard of it. Basically it’s hypertext without needing computers — just notecards and paperclips, though software is certainly allowed. In an… Read More ›

• Not possible! What are emojis doing in 1807?

  By ljd42 on November 11, 2020

  

  How much of this advertisement (from 1807!) can you figure out? Note that it says “hieroglyphical” where we would have said “rebus” when I was a kid or “emojis” today. You’ll probably do much better at reading it than I… Read More ›

• How have I forgotten this number system?

  By ljd42 on November 9, 2020

  

  That’s easy. I couldn’t have forgotten it, as I had never known about it in the first place! We’re talking about the Cistercian number system. Sounds monkish, doesn’t it? Yes, that’s what it is; it was developed by Cistercian monks… Read More ›

• Really? You’re saying Ranked Choice Voting is too hard for adults in Massachusetts?

  By ljd42 on November 8, 2020

  

  My former Quantitative Reasoning (QR) students know that Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) is superior to First Past the Post (FPTP), the system we use in Massachusetts for most elections. So why did Massachusetts adults vote it down by a convincing… Read More ›

• Is it easy to teach an interactive map class online?

  By ljd42 on November 6, 2020

  

  Nine months ago I wrote about a mapping workshop at the Boston Public Library. That was before the pandemic, even if it feels like the pandemic has been going on for a couple of years now. Why, you may ask,… Read More ›

• The true name of the bear (in XKCD, not Vernor Vinge)

  By ljd42 on November 5, 2020

  

  True names are important: if somebody knows your true name, they have power over you. I’m not talking about Vernor Vinge’s important novella, True Names, although there is definitely a strong connection with it. Many contributors to social media, as we know,… Read More ›

• Hexagonal squares???

  By ljd42 on November 3, 2020

  

  Taking a much-needed break from watching the nail-biting election returns, we will consider hexagonal squares. “No such thing,” you say, since you are a knowledgeable geometer. I first saw the phrase “hexagonal squares” when I was 13 or 14, reading… Read More ›

• Science fiction? Greek mythology? Philosophy? All in Jo Walton’s The Philosopher Kings

  By ljd42 on November 1, 2020

  

  Three months ago I reviewed Jo Walton’s The Just City. Recently I finished reading the sequel, The Philosopher Kings, which is equally fascinating and equally worth reading. “We don’t know when we are,” as one character remarks. When, not where. The gods live “outside… Read More ›

• What’s wrong with spelling reform anyway? And what about the Shaw Alphabet?

  By ljd42 on October 30, 2020

  

  I’ve heard that there are some people who think that English spelling is difficult. In fact, I think I know a couple of them. But nobody has to spend years learning how to spell Spanish words, so why do we… Read More ›

• I am the very model of…

  By ljd42 on October 28, 2020

  

  No, I’m not talking about Tom Lehrer’s famous song, “The Elements,” nor about n–2 others of the n parodies of Gilbert & Sullivan’s Major General’s song, where n must be a large number. I’m talking about “I Am the very Model of a Biblical… Read More ›

• Who remembers diagramming sentences? And what does it have to do with Facebook? And the Supreme Court?

  By ljd42 on October 27, 2020

  

  Who remembers diagramming sentences? I do, I do! If you’re my age, you never forget the experience of diagramming sentences. Love it or hate it (I was one of the few who loved it), you don’t forget it. Maybe you forget… Read More ›

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