I sent a mini unit circle to Dr. Alex Kontorovich, and he posted a short video. Previously I posted a video on this and Ralph Pantozzi retweeted and we got 10,000 views till I accidentally deleted the post. This time Dr. Kontorvich’s followers really grabbed it and it went around the globe and in less than 3 days had over
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2020 Real Places Conference!
Elizabeth Lay, our math in history expert anchored our exhibit table and Claire Steffens, Director of Experience for Pioneer Farms co-presented with MathHappens Foundation Director Lauren Siegel. Go Team! We had a great time. Some links and information: We learned to use laser cutters at Austins own laser coop: MakeATX For a short and informative explanation of Golden Calipers
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A 119 Year Quest to Understand Tessellating, Convex, Irregular Pentagons
The idea for MathHappens to work with tessellating pentagons originated from intern Jason Gorst’s suggestions for future projects on his final report. A tessellation describes an arrangement of shapes that tiles a plane with no gaps or overlaps.The challenge of finding all possible tessellating pentagons was issued in 1900 by David Hilbert at the International Congress of Mathematicians in Paris
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MathHappens @ New York’s Museum of Mathematics MOVES Conference
We brought our suite of Navigation Math to New York to share how we relate math to Texas History and the voyage of La Belle which is on exhibit at the Texas State History Museum. Participants learned about Mercator Maps, how parallel rulers are useful to translate lines so that course headings can be related to a compass rose. We
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MathHappens @ TEKSCon Showcase 2019 July 30
At the Showcase you can meet Elizabeth Lay, MathHappens’ Program Manager who is developing an innovative new unit. MathHappens has obtained an original manuscript written by Texas surveyor Robert Creuzbauer that details a dual system of land measurement standards unique to Texas. The new unit will connect Texas History and Mathematics curricula addressing TEKS for both math and history.
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How Tall is the Flagpole- Using mirrors to find Proportions CAMT 2019
Introduction We ask our students to imagine a huge variety of scenarios in math class: trains approaching each other, roller coasters, boats sailing into the wind, buying ice cream, baking cakes, filling vases, sharing pizzas and on. But our students come from a wide variety of backgrounds, with very different life experiences and may not be able to relate to
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CAMT Presentation July 10!
We are excited to bring two backpacks full of MathHappens goodies for door prizes. Paola Garcia and I are co-presenting a session with star Austin High math teacher Mardi Nott. Participants are going to look into each others eyes and discover the power of geometry to analyze light reflections, using similar triangles to reveal the height or distance of objects
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UTeach STEM Educators Conference
MathHappens participated in the playground where we had an opportunity to show our models, and debut the complete set of Tessellating pentagons as well as Penrose tiles. In addition we offered a session on working with the museum community to combat math misery (presentation slides here), and build a sense of purpose and community in math class. Here’s a handout
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Mardi Nott Presents at AACTM
On Saturday, Mardi Nott presented about math field trips with MathHappens at the AACTM Winter Conference. AACTM stands for Austin Area Council of Teacher of Mathematics, which is affiliated with the National Council of Teacher of Mathematics (NCTM). Our presentation slides are available here. Mardi presented about field trips she has done to the Austin Nature and Science Center, Harry
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Region XIII Ed Camp – Unconferencing
Very excited to participate in this conference. Lauren, Abdul, Paola and Ben all attended and also led sessions and learned a lot about this new format. Discussion based, the sessions are facilitated rather than led. Project based learning, maker spaces, equity and math were all on the topic lists. Teachers were really interested in the Napier’s Bones models we
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