Honored to Receive a MoMath Rosenthal Prize!

Lauren SiegelEvents, Sharing IdeasLeave a Comment

Title:  Engagement with Ratio and Proportion:  Building a tool to deepen understanding.  The full, final  lesson plan will be available soon here and on the MoMath website. The MoMath Rosenthal Prize is for Innovation and Inspiration in Math Teaching.  I wrote up a lesson on proportional calipers that was selected as the 2021 runner up prize.  The best part is that

Educator Night at The Thinkery

Josephine ShengCommunity Partnerships, Intern Experience, Teacher Support & TrainingLeave a Comment

MathHappens Interns Josephine Sheng and Viyang Shah had the opportunity to try out an activity on Freese’s Dissections at The Thinkery’s Educator Night on October 17th, 2019. They had a great time interacting with educators in the Austin area and demonstrate to them how math can be approachable and fun. Some even said they’d leave their personalized puzzles at their

A 119 Year Quest to Understand Tessellating, Convex, Irregular Pentagons

Michelle TatCommunity Partnerships, Conference Presentations, Library, Museum, Nature & Science Center, Parks & Recreation, We think math is fun!Leave a Comment

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

MathHappens @ Austin Museum Day- You are Invited!

Lauren SiegelCommunity Partnerships, Events, History Connections, Intern Experience, Museum, Nature & Science Center, Parks & Recreation, Ways to like math, We think math is fun!Leave a Comment

In this photo Ximena Mercado Garcia has items from each Museum Day math station on the table to share with Univision and their viewers. Las matemáticas también pueden ser divertidas. ¡Únete y descúbrelo tu mismo! Sarah Bacca is sending this note with all the details to teachers, principals and schools.  We hope everyone gets the word! Dear Math Enthusiasts,  

15 Tessellating Pentagons Project

Lauren SiegelMaking MathLeave a Comment

We are very excited to have our first batch of all 15 Pentagons!  Thanks to Parker Dewey intern Jason Gorst for having this idea back in January.  We have since celebrated Marjorie Rice and her contribution to the pentagon project, and it inspired a whole series on tessellation that we have brought to schools, the library, the Thinkery, the Nature

How Tall is the Flagpole- Using mirrors to find Proportions CAMT 2019

Lauren SiegelConference Presentations, Events, Teacher Support & Training, Ways to like math, We think math is fun!Leave a Comment

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

MathHappens EOY Party

Lauren SiegelEvents, Intern Experience, We think math is fun!Leave a Comment

We invited interns, staff, families, colleagues from UTeach, UT Math,  MakeATX, AISD and from the Austin Musuem world. We had a food buffet upstairs and a math buffet downstairs including things we’ve collected and things we’ve made.  Great conversations and a nice afternoon together.   Thanks to Cliff Hill for coming to show us how throw those knives  right!  Thanks

Visit to the NY City Museum of Modern Art

Lauren SiegelIntern ExperienceLeave a Comment

What a great way to start the new year!   Mengyu Chen, a recent graduate of Vassar College  signed on for our Parker Dewey Internship in December and I’m so glad she did.  She did the intern reading, and spent some time with some calipers and other models.  Then she visited at least two museums.  She combined  her knowledge of