patrick honner

Math teacher in Brooklyn, New York

Writing to Reduce Test Anxiety

This is an interesting report on the effect of writing on test-anxiety.

http://www.insidescience.org/research/1.1885

In one study, a periodic writing assignment improved the scores of women in a college physics course.  In another, writing before a math exam improved the scores of high school and college students.  In this second study, the most anxious students showed the most improvement.

The nature of the writing exercises is also interesting.  In the first study, students were prompted to write something “values-affirming” (i.e., positive) at the beginning of the semester, and again several weeks in.  In the second study, students were asked to write immediately before the exam, and they were prompted to write specifically about their anxieties.  In both cases, writing had a positive impact for a significant number of students.

www.MrHonner.com

By patrick honner, ago

Cam-based Mathematics

This is an awesome old-school style video demonstrating how simple cam-based mechanical systems can be implemented to process numbers.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-F7m02XDfvE

Calculating reciprocals, squares, and tangents using rotating disks:  it’s amazing stuff!  I wish I had seen (and appreciated) something like this as a young student.  It might have made me appreciate engineering a little more.

Be sure to check out the barrel cam at the end that is used to compute gun elevation.  I imagine something like this is at the heart of the mechanical calculators out there.

By patrick honner, ago

Graph Theory eBook

Here is a complete text on Graph Theory freely available on-line:

http://www.math.jussieu.fr/~jabondy/books/gtwa/gtwa.html

This appears to be a college- or graduate-level text, and it covers the basic ideas from Graphs and Trees to Colorings and Networks.

Each chapter is available as a separate PDF and contains numerous exercises.  There are a number of appendices, like this one discussing Some Interesting Graphs, as well as a glossary and index.

I wish my own professor had used this, rather than making us all spend $100 on a flimsy paperback textbook!

By patrick honner, ago

Math Encounters: Craig Kaplan on Math and Art

Craig Kaplan’s Math Encounters talk, “Revolution and Evolution in Math and Design,” was a whirlwind tour of the design space that lies at the intersection of computer science, mathematics, technology, and art.   Kaplan, a professor of computer science at Waterloo university, is an innovative software engineer, an accomplished artist, and a passionate and engaging speaker.  His talk wove together the mathematical and cultural history of Islamic art, tilings of the plane, non-Euclidean geometries, and the mathematics of aesthetics.

The Math Encounters series, sponsored by the Museum of Mathematics, strives to bring mathematics to the public through dynamic speakers, meaningful topics, and engaging interactivity.  In that spirit, after the talk Kaplan and George Hart led a fun, collaborative workshop where the audience teamed up to create a work of art themselves!

Using some tape, some scissors, and some clever mathematics, each group turned their table into a “tile” using the techniques Kaplan covered in his talk.

And as each group finished their “tiles”, we started putting them all together!

It was a fun and fitting end to an inspiring and mind-opening evening!  You can learn more about Craig Kaplan and his work at his webpage.

By patrick honner, ago
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