Enthusiasm for Math at the Austin Central Library Kids Block Party!

Lauren SiegelEvents, Intern Experience, Library, Ways to like math, We think math is fun!1 Comment

If you ever wondered if families, adults, kids, teens would be interested in some math on a Saturday, this should answer your question.  We brought Tessellations, and in particular some designed with Marjorie Rice’s discoveries and we also featured Lewis Carroll’s puzzles, tangrams and cipher codes.  MH team:  Kyla Kalugdan, Josephine Sheng and Lauren Siegel, and special thanks to our

Tree Measuring at the Buda Public Library

Lauren SiegelCommunity Partnerships, Events, LibraryLeave a Comment

Michelle, Paola and Kyla headed out to the Buda Public Library Spring Fling April 14 to measure a special tree.  Consensus says its 13 feet tall.  Participants learned to use a quadrant and landscape measuring tape to set up their calculation.  They also made plumb line necklaces.  Thanks to the City of Buda and youth librarian Caitlin Foley!

Killeen Brain Blast

Lauren SiegelCommunity Partnerships, Events, Intern Experience, Library, Ways to like math, We think math is fun!Leave a Comment

We were invited to bring some Math to Killeen Texas on Saturday March 9th and we brought a lot!  See the Program guide Michelle made.  You can also follow links in the guide to some quickie videos that explain the math activities and models we took with us to Killeen. MathHappens staff for this event included Quan Vuong, Alex Li,

Pop up Math at Austin’s Central Library

Lauren SiegelCommunity Partnerships, Intern Experience, LibraryLeave a Comment

Exhibiting a Globular Map, an “Innovative” Mercator Map (1500s) and a Modern Map to show the way maps changed over time for purposes of navigation.  The Globe shows us the true proportions of the continents, and the 3d printed Stereographic shell shows how translating a sphere to a flat surface can cause the kinds of distortions the Mercator map.  Ben,

Austin Museum Day Part 2: Harry Ransom Center

Lauren SiegelLibrary, Museum4 Comments

MathHappens was happy to be back at the Harry Ransom Center for Austin Museum Day. Activities for the day were based on the Ransom Center’s Lewis Carroll collection. Our math activities included making your own secretly coded name tag using a cipher key based on Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. We had tangrams which could be rearranged to look like the

Little Free Library

Christopher DanielsonCommunity Partnerships, Library, Sponsoring Mathematics ProjectsLeave a Comment

What we learned: The Little Free Library is a non profit organization that provides materials to construct a free library for homeowners. The libraries are free and passersby can take or leave books. The organization runs promotions to help engage potential librarians and were interested in a math book donation for Pi Day. MathHappens: We donated 250 copies of Thinking