Great Moments in Failed Math Notation

Courtesy Benjamin Peirce (1809-1880):

Yes, that’s a squiggle for pi.

Curious Results in India Merit Pay Study

This study came out in November of 2006, but I haven’t heard much reference to it.
Teacher Incentives in Developing Countries by Karthik Muralidharan and Venkatesh Sundararaman
Many studies in educational statistics don’t do any legwork; they just pick some district X that implemented some program Y to see what happens. This doesn’t have the precision of a [...]

The “Any Questions?” effect

So, I took my 6th and 7th periods to a presentation by a speaker from a university who tried to sell a summer program for math, science, and engineering. At the end of the presentation, she asked “are there any questions?”
Dead silence.
“If we’re done here, I can send you back to class and you can [...]

Math Timeline

Today’s slide:

I find it entirely meaningless for both myself and the students if I say something happened “in 250 BC”, but if I put events we’ve learned about in relation to each other they take some sort of form. I add to the timeline graphic as we learn about new things.
I still think this could [...]

Geometric Multiplication Method

I’ve seen many “alternate” methods of adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing, but this one is new to me (and in the opinion of this math-nerd author, very slick):
Youtube link
(For my students) Why does this work?
(For anyone) Are there other geometrical math tricks like this one?

Pre-Calc Students Kick Butt More Than Projected

Good grief, I haven’t seen this in a Pre-Calculus class before:

That’s on my last test (Trig. review, basically). If I put up the bars it wouldn’t even remotely resemble a bell curve.
I know it wasn’t cake either, because I gave a similar test last year with more typical results.
Most missed questions (at least partially):
1. Given [...]

Once I Was Almost Killed By a Falling McDonald’s Sign

No, really.
Although not the one that says “500 quadrillion served” but a special one that was made for a new location that just opened on the University of Arizona campus.
Fact 1: The sign was made of metal and hanging on bolts about 12 feet up.
Fact 2: How heavy? Somewhere in the “this could kill you” [...]