"Okay," says the teacher, relentlessly cheerful as teachers of youngish children are expected to be, "does everyone understand this chapter?"
"YES!" bellow the assembled students.
"Have you all finished the sample problems?" the teacher continues.
"YES!" the kids chorus again.
"Are there any questions about the homew--"
"NO!"
You probably can guess the punch line. But if not, check it out (just copy and paste):
http://www.babyblues.com/archive/index.php?formname=getstrip&GoToDay=11/29/2009
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Saturday, December 12, 2009
The Week with Less Pizza
As you may know, the 3-4 students have been keeping track of pizza sales thus far this year. Yes, we have records stretching back as far as, let me see, September 10 or so!
For quite some time, as you'll see on the graph pictured below (in two parts), the total pizza order was a rather dull oscillation between 144 slices (18 whole pizza pies) and 152 slices (19 pies). Week after week, 144 or 152, 152 or 144. You could set your watch by it. It was like, I don't know, jazz music or Blue's Clues or driving on Interstate 65 in northern Indiana or something. As the graph shows, the median (the middle value when the data points are ordered) stayed within a very constrained band of numbers, and the range (the difference between the lowest and highest values) remained absolutely, boringly, even mindnumbingly consistent.
[Note that the number of slices actually ordered by lower school students doesn't match the number of slices we actually buy. Why is that, I wonder? Hmmm...]
Then, all of a sudden one Friday, the number of slices ordered took a nosedive. Fell off a cliff, or at least rolled down a slope, as the graph makes clear. Woke us all up, I tell you that. Boom, all the way down from the 150 region to...104. 104! Think of it! The median didn't change (why it didn't was food for thought for some of the students), but the range changed, oh boy did it ever.
Why would things be so different this week? I asked the gathered third and fourth grade children (after swearing to secrecy Ellen's class, which had handled the order and therefore knew the answer). What possibilities do you think there are?
They came up with four:
A) There were a LOT of kids out with swine flu.
B) Some of the classes were on a field trip.
C) The pizza place ran out of pizza partway through.
And
D) Not very many people were hungry for pizza that day.
I wonb't tbell ybou thbe rbeal ansbwer. But wbith anby lbuck, yobu cban gbuess.
For quite some time, as you'll see on the graph pictured below (in two parts), the total pizza order was a rather dull oscillation between 144 slices (18 whole pizza pies) and 152 slices (19 pies). Week after week, 144 or 152, 152 or 144. You could set your watch by it. It was like, I don't know, jazz music or Blue's Clues or driving on Interstate 65 in northern Indiana or something. As the graph shows, the median (the middle value when the data points are ordered) stayed within a very constrained band of numbers, and the range (the difference between the lowest and highest values) remained absolutely, boringly, even mindnumbingly consistent.
[Note that the number of slices actually ordered by lower school students doesn't match the number of slices we actually buy. Why is that, I wonder? Hmmm...]
Then, all of a sudden one Friday, the number of slices ordered took a nosedive. Fell off a cliff, or at least rolled down a slope, as the graph makes clear. Woke us all up, I tell you that. Boom, all the way down from the 150 region to...104. 104! Think of it! The median didn't change (why it didn't was food for thought for some of the students), but the range changed, oh boy did it ever.
Why would things be so different this week? I asked the gathered third and fourth grade children (after swearing to secrecy Ellen's class, which had handled the order and therefore knew the answer). What possibilities do you think there are?
They came up with four:
A) There were a LOT of kids out with swine flu.
B) Some of the classes were on a field trip.
C) The pizza place ran out of pizza partway through.
And
D) Not very many people were hungry for pizza that day.
I wonb't tbell ybou thbe rbeal ansbwer. But wbith anby lbuck, yobu cban gbuess.
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
What to Wear in Winter
As a high school student, I came up with a foolproof (and very mathematical) way to determine what winter clothes I needed.
I attended a PK-12 school, and the estimate depended on the behavior of two very different student groups: kindergarteners and sixth/seventh graders.
The K students were sent in (by parents) with masses of winter protection--coats, boots, hats, mittens, earmuffs, scarves, alpenstocks, beeveils, etc--and sent out (by teachers, into the elements) the same way.
The 6th/7th graders, regardless of what they were sent in wearing or sent out wearing, very quickly removed as much outer clothing as possible. There was something truly cool about wearing short sleeves as the mercury dipped down to the single digits Fahrenheit. (Also something truly frostbitten about it, but when you're in middle school you don't care.)
My formula was simple: to determine what level of clothing I needed, I found the halfway point between the overdressed kindergarteners and the underdressed middle school students. That was what I put on before leaving school.
Worked every time. And to judge by what I see out on our playground this winter, the formula continues to work today!
I attended a PK-12 school, and the estimate depended on the behavior of two very different student groups: kindergarteners and sixth/seventh graders.
The K students were sent in (by parents) with masses of winter protection--coats, boots, hats, mittens, earmuffs, scarves, alpenstocks, beeveils, etc--and sent out (by teachers, into the elements) the same way.
The 6th/7th graders, regardless of what they were sent in wearing or sent out wearing, very quickly removed as much outer clothing as possible. There was something truly cool about wearing short sleeves as the mercury dipped down to the single digits Fahrenheit. (Also something truly frostbitten about it, but when you're in middle school you don't care.)
My formula was simple: to determine what level of clothing I needed, I found the halfway point between the overdressed kindergarteners and the underdressed middle school students. That was what I put on before leaving school.
Worked every time. And to judge by what I see out on our playground this winter, the formula continues to work today!
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
On Family Size
It's important to connect numbers with real-life situations. Which is why I had 4th graders tell "stories" about the multiplication expression 4 x 6 as a warmup for a lesson this week. By "stories," I hasten to say, I don't mean great literary efforts, with foreshadowing and metaphor and plot twists and poetic license and all those great things. No, I mean simple situations like these:
"There were 4 glasses and each glass had 6 ice cubes in it."
"There were 4 people and each one ate 6 hot dogs."
"I saw 4 flowers. Each flower had 6 petals."
You'll note that in each case the 4 [the first number in the expression] represents the number of groups, and the 6 [the second number in the expression] represents the number in each group. Of course, 4 x 6 is equal to 6 x 4, which all the children I was working with that day knew perfectly well; but it's useful to think of the first and second numbers each playing a slightly different role in the expression.
And we were progressing swimmingly until one boy said, "There were 4 families and each family had 6..." Then his voice trailed off, and he thought, and then he said, "I mean, there were SIX families, and each family had 4 people in it."
Real-life situations indeed. No prizes for guessing how many people there were in his family!
"There were 4 glasses and each glass had 6 ice cubes in it."
"There were 4 people and each one ate 6 hot dogs."
"I saw 4 flowers. Each flower had 6 petals."
You'll note that in each case the 4 [the first number in the expression] represents the number of groups, and the 6 [the second number in the expression] represents the number in each group. Of course, 4 x 6 is equal to 6 x 4, which all the children I was working with that day knew perfectly well; but it's useful to think of the first and second numbers each playing a slightly different role in the expression.
And we were progressing swimmingly until one boy said, "There were 4 families and each family had 6..." Then his voice trailed off, and he thought, and then he said, "I mean, there were SIX families, and each family had 4 people in it."
Real-life situations indeed. No prizes for guessing how many people there were in his family!
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