
There’s no place like home for math education - fogus
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/theres-no-place-like-home-for-math.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+blogspot%2FMKuf+%28Official+Google+Blog%29
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jergason
"My daughter and I have a bedtime routine where we read a story and also make
up mathematical word problems that we solve together."

I am a late-bloomer in mathematics, by way of computer science. I love my
parents and had a wonderful childhood, but I grew up thinking math was boring,
and my interest in my high school and early college courses was shallow at
best. I think it is wonderful that the author spends time with his daughter
and also gives her some math practice. I feel like my life would have been
different if I had grown up liking math instead of coming to it late.

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Sukotto
I wish he gave an example of what sorts of things he and his daughter come up
with (and her approx age or grade level)

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barkingllama
This is a story about Tory and the leaky canoe. Tory loves rowing her canoe in
the pond (while wearing a certified floatation device and carrying the proper
safety whistle, of course), and she rows at least 2 hours a day.
Unfortunately, today Tory found 2 large holes in the bottom of her 200 gallon,
60 pound canoe, and she's afraid she won't be able to row for the day.
Assuming the two holes in the canoe are approximately 2 inches in diameter,
and Tory weighs 75 pounds, how long will Tory be able to row before she has to
utilize her safety whistle and flotation device?

Tory is paddling in fresh water, and her force is distributed equally between
the two holes.

You know, just a run-of-the-mill math question for a 3rd grader...

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pbhjpbhj
>200 gallon, 60 pound

Is it 4 score hogshead moons per gross of firkin?

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kragen

        kragen@inexorable:~$ units
        2411 units, 71 prefixes, 33 nonlinear units
    
        You have: 4 score hogshead moons per gross of firkin
        Unknown unit 'moons'
        You have: 
    

Were you thinking lunar months, moon masses, moon radii, moon apogee...?

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pbhjpbhj
I was thinking "moons" as a period of time, so a lunar month :
[time][volume]/[volume]

As in "We'll see 3 more moons before yon mountain dons his snowy cape." or
some such yokel-ese.

~~~
kragen
Well, fourscore hogshead per gross of firkin is 3.8̄ (i.e. 35/9), so fourscore
hogshead-moons per gross of firkin is about 115 days.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
It was intended as a witty remark, I only parsed for unitary conformance not
for value and didn't bother to answer the question.

Perhaps you'd like to do it and provide the answer in these units?

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hexis
If there's no place like _home_ for math education, why are they giving money
to _schools_?

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l0c0b0x
From the post, the editor almost wants to yell out that money is not going to
be the only solution. Parents need to keep the kids involved and motivated
towards math.

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tshauck
The majority of my math education came from my sister who was a few years
ahead of me in school. She'd learn w/e they were teaching, then would teach it
to me at night. I'm forever in debt for this early education as it'd helped me
in so many aspects of my life.

