The 8 Times Tables Can Be Cool

As many of my students know I do not enjoy times tables. I missed quite a bit of primary school maths so speedy tables are not my thing. In particular it's the 8s that make me pause the most. Speed doesn't matter, it's the process. For me it's just doubling my four times tables.

Bec Campbell shared the following with me and yes it is pretty cool. Even cooler is to ask why it happens....

Roman Numerals

Hello all - Catherine Fee shared this video with me and we watched it in class to look at a way of communicating your knowledge and understanding of a number system from history.

Thanks Catherine!

History of Number Systems Investigation - some links

Where to begin when looking for information on different number systems?

You could ask your parents - maybe they know about a cool system for numbers and counting. 

You could ask your librarian - there are books about mathematics!

There are some sites online too. Ms. O'Hara and I have found some sites to share with you.
If you search, use good search terms. One of my favourites is "for kids". I use this in almost every search I do (:

Binary at mathisfun http://www.mathsisfun.com/binary-number-system.html
Counting on your fingers with binary http://www.mathsisfun.com/numbers/binary-count-fingers.html

Roman Numerals http://www.ducksters.com/kidsmath/roman_numerals.php

Archimedes Lab http://www.archimedes-lab.org/numeral.html

Numberphile is a wonderful Youtube channel

This one has a long list of number systems and labels their complexity or simplicity with happy and not so happy faces.   http://gwydir.demon.co.uk/jo/numbers/comparison.htm  

Another page on this site is http://gwydir.demon.co.uk/jo/numbers/index.htm with a few famous number systems.

This is a bit more ‘wordy’: http://www.math.wichita.edu/history/topics/num-sys.html

This site had some interesting facts, but it might be a little challenging with its sophisticated matheamatical language http://mentalfloss.com/article/31879/12-mind-blowing-number-systems-other-languages

The Human Calculator

Thank you to Aidan Sturge. I did enjoy and was pleased to start class with it today. I am also keen to check out that Youtube channel. Thanks for sharing!

From: Aidan Sturge
Subject: human calculator

Check this video out this guy I saw on TV a while ago he is faster than  a calculator the link is below:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtotrboSUqQ

Hope you enjoy

-Aidan

Noodles, hair, atoms, exponential growth and decay and fractions.

This cool Youtube video has mathematics relevant for grade six and grade 11 courses right now.

For grade six - they can compare it with the doubling we did when we discussed ebola. They can also look at half of a half - multiplying a fraction by a fraction or as we say in mathsland the product of two fractions.

Grade 11 - this is exponential growth and decay simultaneously depending on how you view your noodles.

Maths and you guessed it... Christmas

Here is a gift for you from Mathsland - a game. It's the latest thing and Jo Boaler of Stanford likes it so much she is now on the team..

Download Mathbreakers and puzzle it out. It looks like Mathbreakers will just keep growing too.

And this ancient game - I haven't beaten the computer yet. Can you? Cool Math - Mancala

For the next game you will need a 10 by 10 grid - this is called How Close to 100? To make it more challenging try How Close to 1 and use decimals. This is from Jo Boaler.

You will need

• two players

• two dice

• recording sheet

This game is played in partners. Two children share a blank 100 grid. The first partner rolls two number dice.

The numbers that come up are the numbers the child uses to make an array on the 100 grid. They can put the array anywhere on the grid, but the goal is to fill up the grid to get it as full as possible. After the player draws the array on the grid, she writes in the number sentence that describes the grid. The second player then rolls the dice, draws the number grid and records their number sentence. The game ends when both players have rolled the dice and cannot put any more arrays on the grid. How close to 100 can you get?

Variation Each child can have their own number grid. Play moves forward to see who can get closest to 100. 

Your Life on Earth - cool interactive from the BBC

Your life on earth

Enter your details and this cool interactive will show you some of the things that have happened in your life time.

Enjoy!

BBC Earth Story Right Here

and while I am here this is pretty cool too:
World Population and Me

From The Good People at the Guardian Data Blog

Data data data - it's the information age your data is being harvested right now. Somewhere someone is using technology to record that you are reading this blog post. If they can they will also record any metadata they can too. 

You work with data too and it's important to know what all those terms mean - download speed, bits, bytes, Mbps and MBps. 

Have you downloaded or uploaded in different countries? Check out this cool visualisation of various speeds and quality of the internet - you can change the countries...

Have fun!

Download deathmatch: compare internet speed worldwide

Cat photo by Flickr user wenlian chen

source:  "Download deathmatch: compare internet speed worldwide ..." 2013. 14 Oct. 2014 <http://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/interactive/2013/dec/15/compare-internet-speed-worldwide>

Does 1 = 0.9999...?

Ask yourself the question first. What do YOU think about the question and why?

How about the other ninths?

Once you have puzzled over this question, please enjoy the following two videos from Numberphile and Vi Hart, two legends.

Puzzling needs to take at least five minutes.

Also, DP students, the previous post is very new with you in mind. All others are very welcome.

Vi Hart

Numberphile

teeny and HUGE Numbers

In Diploma Mathematical Studies we are starting the course looking at the story of Number and how we communicate all sorts of things with different types of Numbers.

You are all probably familiar with Natural Numbers and Integers but there are also Rational, Real and Imaginary numbers. When society needs more from mathematics to push through and develop in some way we develop new systems to make that possible.

Number types tell the story of society and its complexity.

Check out these sites:
FSU (where my dad did his doctorate) and their famous Powers of ten
and this famous video - it's old but the numbers are relevant



We have had these types of numbers in this blog before. Please visit or revisit for your mathematical enjoyment about the scale of the universe(s).

CLICK right here

Number Sense - Thanks Ajarn Dale

Hey there maths fans!

Ajarn Dale sent on some cool "Math Tricks". Some people think that these tricks are cheating, but in actual fact it's about understanding numbers and being able to make them work for YOU.

Check them out here in wisebread.com - thanks Ajarn Dale.
11 useful math tricks

Numbers in a City: New Haven / 1997 / SML by See-ming Lee licensed under CC by A SA