Comments on: Anne Glamore: Master Mathematician

By: My Tiny Kingdom » Great Mom, or Pelted With Candy Corn?

My Tiny Kingdom » Great Mom, or Pelted With Candy Corn? — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 13:35:23 +0000

[...] beverages as an upper, when I need the boys to be especially hyper. For example, I got them all jacked up on Coke and Mountain Dew before the Maroon 5/ Counting Crows concert so they wouldn’t fall asleep and piss me off [...]

By: Amy

Amy — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 20:35:42 +0000

Oh my gawd. Any math past 3rd grade is up to hubs.

Amy’s last blog post..Growing Pains

By: miss bossy pants

miss bossy pants — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 02:39:16 +0000

When I took my dad, brother, and my 8 year old son to see Switchfoot and Third Day a few weeks ago, I had the same conversations. Except forgetting that I was talking to my dad, I think I gave out some TMI while reminiscing about the old lawn. It was much easier to dance our booties off in the cheap-non-seats.

miss bossy pants’s last blog post..Why institutions don’t know best when it comes to children

By: Anne Glamore

Anne Glamore — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 18:52:44 +0000

I am stunned at the algebraic passion evidenced by these comments, especially when the only passion I wrote about was the horizontal kind.

By: Cassie

Cassie — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 18:13:23 +0000

Forget the math that Finn’s doing, we can’t get past AG 4th grade Algebra at my house. I set on the bed for 4 hours with a circle trying to get 11 equal parts from 4 lines. Never could do it! And Bill and me together were fighting over how to do a simple algebra problem. Apparently there is something on the internet that will figure out equations for you free of charge and correctly, but for the life of us we couldn’t remember how to get the correct answer. Two hours later we had it, then we had to explain it! Oye!

By: E Bird

E Bird — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 01:20:11 +0000

Good grief- while I teach algebra and geometry- I couldn’t get past the concert restroom conversation. We were at a Wayne Newton concert-free tickets and booze-while in the restroom a nice lady about seventy years old dressed like Madonna in the eighties, complete with lace gloves with no fingers and a little hat with feathers, proceeded to reminisce about attending an Elvis concert explicitly professing her desire to XX**))00 in an extremely loud voice. We left the restroom in tears of hysterics.

By: Lindsey

Lindsey — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 00:14:07 +0000

Andrea, it works the same way.. Let me explain. Hehe.

2^4 = 16
2^3 = 8
2^2 = 4
2^1 = 2
2^0 = 1
2^-1 = .5
2^ -2 = .25

So in this case, as you lower the power by 1, you divide by 2, which is the base.

Same thing for any number.
5^4 = 625
5^3 = 125
5^2 = 25
5^1 = 5
5^0 = 1
As you lower the power, you divide by 5.

It’ll work for any number. You just have to establish the pattern.

By: andrea

andrea — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 22:19:56 +0000

Lindsey, yeah, that’s true, but it’s only obvious for ten; it doesn’t really specify why _everything_ raised to the zero power is 1.

By: Jeni

Jeni — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 20:43:47 +0000

“Parental units”? Oh Anne, that is *so* 1993.
Jeni’s last blog post..It Worked!

By: Lindsey

Lindsey — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 19:49:09 +0000

My explanation for why any number to the power of 0 is much simpler. It’s a pattern. For example:

10^6 = 1,000,000
10^5 = 100,000
10^4 = 10,000
10^3 = 1,000
10^2 = 100
10^1 = 10
10^0 = 1

In other words, as you make the exponent smaller by 1, you divide the numerical value by 10, at least in this case. Plus, this pattern also continues to negative exponents and will also work with any other base.

10^-1 = .1
10^-2 = .01
Etc.

I teach 8th grade Math in Delaware and this is exactly how we teach this funky piece of mathematical logic.

And by the way.. while “old school” algebra may not be used in the real world, anytime you try to solve for something you don’t know, that’s algebra!