Lots to catch up on, and over the week-end I’ll begin updating the posts with solutions people have provided, but let’s keep things rolling.
Below are the final three questions from the 1913 Matric trigonometry Honours exam. This follows on from TNDOT 13 and TNDOT 14, and noting Q7 below has already appeared (and solved), as TNDOT 4. As background, the other trig TNDOT posts are TNDOT 1, TNDOT 2 and TNDOT 8.
Have fun.
The University of Sydney, as did many Western universities, found itself entangled in the Israel-Gaza protests. More than most, USyd permitted antisemitic assholes to be antisemitic assholes, and then USyd got walloped for it. In response, USyd commissioned a review of its policies on speech and protest. As reported by The Guardian, the University of Sydney has recently received the report of that review, and the USyd Senate has resolved to accept “in principle” the fifteen recommendations of the report. As The Guardian also suggested, some of these recommendations are nuts: Continue reading “PoSWW 44: USyd’s Incivility”
We’re not paying much attention to the cleaning up of the VCE exam screw-up. Not because it is unimportant but, the clean up being an admin issue rather than a maths issue, because we are not likely to have much to offer. There are still puzzling aspects to this screw-up, seemingly which no reporter has addressed, but maybe it doesn’t matter now. Awfully, VCAA CEO Kylie White is gone, courtesy of a typical Murdoch crusade and typical Liberal cluelessness, and the rest doesn’t much interest us. Yesterday, however, there was a worrying oddity. Continue reading “The Devlin in VCAA’s Details”
When not making annoying non sequitur comments on the blog, Terry Mills works very hard to be a very good teacher. This includes hunting for and working hard to create mathematical resources for his students. One such is a list of problems compiled by Terry. Prompted by Sunday’s problem-solving post, Terry reminded me yesterday of his collection. As Terry put it,
A few years ago I taught a class of VCAL students; VCAL was the predecessor of Foundation Mathematics. I was told that these students are not interested in mathematics; they all want to go into a trade; so teach them something about building.
I met the students and indeed many did want to go into a trade: building, electrician, beauty therapy, or hospitality. Some were there because they had never been successful in mathematics. Some came to Australia as refugees and did not speak English very well.
What did they have in common? Nothing!
So I decided to give classes devoted to solving problems.
Attached is what grew out of my experience.
Many of Terry’s problems are not “problems” in the sense of Sunday’s post (although what constitutes a “problem” is very much in the eye of the beholder). But, whatever one calls them, it seems to me be a very nice collection, very suitable for the students it would suit.*
*) Terry i forgiven for Questions 31 and 32 (just).
(Yes, it’s all been too hard, so I’ve decided to do a Rundle and end it all quickly. The title oughta do it pretty well.)
Last month, I wrote a post riffing off Cooking in a Bedsitter, a very funny and much loved cookbook by Katherine Whitehorn. In preparing the post, I read a bit about Whitehorn who, no surprise, turned out to be a very funny and very feisty lady. Whitehorn was a young woman in 50s London and thrived in the liberation of the times. Not mainly sexual liberation, although that also seemed part of it, but more intellectual and social liberation. Whitehorn revelled in no longer needing to be dainty or so proper. For some great little interview snippets with Whitehorn, go here.
Yes, it is Problem Season here in Crapland. Yesterday there was a new TNDOT, with a couple others still outstanding, and there are more problems, below. But I am less interested in solutions to the problems below than I am in how one might teach them, if that is even the proper phrasing. How, generally, does one teach the techniques, or perhaps the art, of problem-solving? Continue reading “How Does One Teach Problem-Solving?”
Let’s get back to work, and to fun. The TNDOT got derailed by the VCE exams, and the exams screw-up, so let’s try to get it back on track. TNDOT 12 is still there: not of that much interest but people can contribute, and I’ll try to polish that one off with solutions in the next few days.
The one that is open and interesting, from a few weeks back, is TNDOT 13, comprising the first three questions from the 1913 Matric trigonometry Honours exam: a few people have commented and appear to have come up with solutions, although not much has been posted; people are definitely welcome to and encouraged to post solutions. This one is a continuation of that 1913 exam: the next three questions. As background, the other trig TNDOT posts are TNDOT 1, TNDOT 2, TNDOT 4 and TNDOT 8.
Have fun.
I thought of writing this post a year ago, to follow up Daddy’s Simple Lesson, and then forgot about it. A few months ago, I ran into an insane piece of Americana and thought again about the post, and promptly forgot about it again. Now, with Donald J Narcissist about to take over the White House, and with the moronic Left still so far up its own ass it cannot come to terms with why DJN won, it again seems a good time to write the post. Then I can forget about it once and for all. Continue reading “Why I Left America, Twice”
Ed Barbeau is a Canadian maths ed legend, and an occasional commenter here. I previously noted Ed’s astonishingly extensive website, which is also listed in the Good Resources post, and I posted a long comment of Ed’s on gifted education.
Ed has recently compiled a list of classroom problems, accompanied by discussions, which he has used “positively” in classrooms. He is now requesting teachers will also give them a try and see how they go, and let Ed know how they go: Ed wants your feedback.
Ed’s document of problems is here (and is embedded below), and you can email Ed. to provide feedback. (Of course everyone is also free to comment below.) Ed also makes it clear that he is happy for the document to be passed around further afield.
What follows are two (slightly edited) introductions: a short one, which Ed used to introduce the problems on an email group; then the longer introduction from the document, which is worth reading in itself. Continue reading “Notch 9: Ed Barbeau’s Classroom Problems, and His Request”
Last one (counting Foundation). Thank God.
VCAA has now published the exam, here.
And the marking guide is here.
Continue reading “Secret 2024 Foundation Business: Exam Discussion”