A Recursive Process

Domino Spiral

October 19, 2011, 12:00 am

Found by Timon Piccini:

Any questions?

Well of course there are. He sets up the 3-act #wcydwt structure here. Check it out. Great stuff.

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Obfusticated Mandelbrot Set

October 11, 2011, 12:00 am

Coolest thing I’ve seen in a while: High Resolution Mandelbrot code in Python.

The following Python script, on the other hand, begins as ASCII art:

It renders the Mandelbrot set as a full-color, anti-aliased, 1500×1000 image.

Fantastic. Notice that the code also looks likes the mandelbrot...

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Little Gauss and the Dividing Time Puzzler

October 5, 2011, 12:00 am

I gave this problem to the Precalc Honors class, right before their lunch (the block is split into two parts). A couple of them came back with the solution, but most had chosen to eat and socialize (how dare they!). An epiphany hit me when I saw how a student had started to solve the problem. He...

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Cartalk Puzzler – Dividing Time

October 2, 2011, 12:00 am

From Cartalk.

Dividing Time
RAY: Draw a clock face on a piece of paper. Using Arabic numerals put the appropriate numbers at 12, 1, 2, 3 and so on.

Now, somewhere on the clock face, draft two lines. In doing so, you’re going to divide the clock face into segments, which contain numbers.

...

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Twitter Graph Story #anyqs

September 29, 2011, 12:00 am

 

To no one surprise, [removed] was lowest on Monday afternoons and through Tuesday, the beginning of the work week, and rose later in the week, peaking on Saturday and Sunday. The pattern on weekend days was shifted about two hours later — the morning peak closer to 9 a.m. and the evening one p...

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A new cartalk puzzler is up.

When my kids were in school, they, like all the other kids I guess, had to learn their numbers. So each day for homework, they would bring home a list of numbers on a piece of paper, and they were asked to write out the letters that spelled that number, right next to...

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Drag Race #wcydwt

September 14, 2011, 12:00 am

Act 1


http://vimeo.com/29051572

What questions do you have?

Act 2

  • Ask what other things are important for going fast. Is the lightest vehicle alwa...

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1st Day for Intro to Programming: Lightbot

September 9, 2011, 12:00 am

I forget who introduced the Light-bot game to me, but thank you.
I got the link from Hélène Martin. Much thanks!

First day went excellent in Introduction to Programming class. “We get to play a game?

Introduction to loops, functions (methods), and debugging all on the first day, wit...

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Cartalk Puzzler: License Plate

September 3, 2011, 12:00 am

Great puzzler from cartalk:

Deep Tanning
RAY: You’re driving past a high school parking lot on a fine spring afternoon in Our Fair City, watching the kids try to do wheelies with their parents’ station wagons. You happen to notice a car with an interesting license plate. It reads TAN 270. What ma...

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Original on How to Fix Our Math Education article is found here.

Some great responses were mailed in.

Sol Garfunkel and David Mumford are right to observe that the everyday usefulness of our high school math curriculum leaves much to be desired. But since when did practicality become the...

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