Prime Numbers Are like Monkeys

[Photo by mape_s.]

I’m afraid that Math Club may have fallen victim to the economy, which is worse in our town than in the nation in general. Homeschooling families have tight budgets even in the best of times, and now they seem to be cutting back all non-essentials. I assumed that last semester’s students would return, but I should have asked for an RSVP.

Still, Kitten and I had a fun time together. We played four rounds of Tens Concentration, since I had spread out cards on the tables in the library meeting room before we realized that no one was coming. Had to pick up the cards one way or another, so we figured we might as well enjoy them! She won the first two rounds, which put her in a good mood for our lesson.

I had written “Prime numbers are like monkeys!” on the whiteboard, and Kitten asked me what that meant. That was all the encouragement I needed to launch into my planned lesson, despite the frustrating dearth of students. The idea is taken from Danica McKellar’s book Math Doesn’t Suck.

Continue reading Prime Numbers Are like Monkeys

Cardstock Geometry Puzzle

While browsing the Kim Komando website for ideas I could use in my blogging class, I followed a rabbit trail through Kim’s video archive. I think we will try this in Math Club next semester:

If the embedded video doesn’t work on your computer, you can find the original here: Unbelievable Paper Transformer.

Update

Simon posted a template for the puzzle at his MathsClass blog.

Math Teachers at Play #20

blue icosahedron, by shonk[Photo by shonk.]

Welcome to the Math Teachers At Play blog carnival — which is not just for math teachers! If you like to learn new things and play around with ideas, you are sure to find something of interest.

Let’s start the mathematical fun with a couple of puzzles in honor of our 20th edition: First, the shape to our right is an icosahedron, one of the Platonic solids. Each face is an equilateral triangle — can you count them? For more fun, make your own model.

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Math Teachers at Play #8

party-child-by-jaaron

[Photo by jaaron.]

Welcome to the Math Teachers At Play blog carnival — which is not just for math teachers! We accept entries from anyone who enjoys playing around with math, as long as the topic is relevant to students or teachers of preK-12th grade mathematics.

Some articles were submitted by their authors, other were drawn from the back-log in my blog reader, and I’ve spiced it all up with a few math jokes courtesy of the Mathematical humor collection of Andrej and Elena Cherkaev.

Let the mathematical fun begin…

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Quilt: What Can You Do with This?


[Ragged Squares Quilt photos used with permission from Crazy Mom Quilts.]

I know other teachers have done math quilts, but I’ve never gotten around to trying it in any of my classes. Still, this image caught my eye and practically begged me to make it into a math lesson for my elementary math club.

I thought of at least two ways I could go with this, but I bet that if we put our brains together, we can come up with even more creative ideas. So here’s the question, ala Dan Meyer:

  • What can you do with this?

How could you use this image as a springboard to doing math? What questions would you ask? What concepts would you try to get across? What would you follow it with? Please comment!

Other photos are available…

Continue reading Quilt: What Can You Do with This?

Tangrams and Other Dissection Puzzles

tangram-cat[Photo by jimmiehomeschoolmom.]

One of the things I meant to do with my elementary math class (the one that got canceled due to low enrollment):

And then we would play around with Tangram puzzles, and perhaps make up a few of our own.

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Kids’ Project: More Math Calendars?

tulips-by-kuzeytac[Photo by Kuzeytac.]

Several people enjoyed the April calendar and asked if there would be a May version. Unfortunately, my homeschool co-op classes are out until next fall, so I don’t have enough kids to make up problems for me. But if your children would like to send in some puzzles, I will be glad to put another calendar together. If we get enough participation, we could have calendars every month for the rest of the year!

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Puzzle: Factoring Trinomials

Factoring Puzzle

My high school class ended the year with a review of multiplying and factoring simple polynomials. We played this matching game, and then I gave them a puzzle worksheet. I liked this idea, but I didn’t like the decoded answer. In my opinion, puzzles should give the student a “reward” for solving them — maybe a joke or riddle or something — but that answer seemed almost like nagging.

So I changed things around to make my own version:

Continue reading Puzzle: Factoring Trinomials

Math Teachers at Play #5

[Photo by Alex Kehr.]

Welcome to the Math Teachers At Play blog carnival — which is not just for math teachers! If you like to learn new things and play around with ideas, you are sure to find something of interest. Let the mathematical fun begin…

Continue reading Math Teachers at Play #5