I’ve never seen a trigonometric warning sign before, but it makes a good point!
Appreciation
Subscription Issues — Catching Up on Recent Posts
If you subscribe to MrHonner.com via email, you likely have not been receiving updates for the past two weeks. This was the result of an error in a software upgrade, but the issue appears to have been resolved. I apologize for the technical difficulties.
In case you missed them, here are links to my new posts from the past two weeks. Enjoy! And if you aren’t subscribed to my site, please consider signing up at the right!
Math Quiz: NYT Learning Network (October 22, 2012)
Mathblogging.org Profile (October 21st, 2012)
Math Art: Nucleus, by Tim Locke (October 1t 9th, 2012)
Birthday Frequency Visualization (October 17th, 2012)
Another Embarrassingly Bad Math Exam Question (October 15th, 2012)
Math Art: Skunks (October 14th, 2012)
Relatively Prime: 1 + 1 = 2 (October 12th, 2012)
N Ways to Apply Algebra with the New York Times — Comments (October 10th, 2012)
Math Art: Student Sliceforms (October 7th, 2012)
Appreciation Technology Testing
This is Not a Trig Function
I spend a lot of time looking at New York State Math Regents Exams. In addition to the critical analysis of the exams I undertake here, we typically grade several thousand exams at the end of each year at my school.
When grading so many exams, it’s not uncommon to feel disoriented and unsettled looking at the same problems over and over again. However, there was something particularly unsettling about this question.
This trigonometric function just appeared to be too round to me. Perhaps my senses were just dulled after hours of grading.
Thankfully, we have Geogebra to settle such mathematical disputes.
I was right! It is too round. Thanks again, Geogebra, for enabling my mathematical compulsions.
Related Posts
- Regents Recaps
- This is Still Not a Trig Function
- This is Not an Exponential Function
- These are Not Parabolas
- Still Not a Trig Function
Appreciation Art Geometry Student Work Teaching
Math Art: Student Sliceforms
As a project in my Calculus course, students built sliceforms. Some of them turned out quite beautifully!
Sliceforms highlight the way we can use two-dimensional cross-sections to understand and represent surfaces in three dimensions.
You can see more examples of student sliceforms here, on my Facebook page.
Appreciation Geometry
9/15/12 — Happy Right Triangle Day!
Happy Right Triangle Day! Today, on 9/15/12, we celebrate a favorite triangle: the 9-12-15 right triangle.
We know this triangle is right because the side lengths satisfy the Pythagorean Theorem.
This isn’t the only Right Triangle Day this year. And these two right triangles work together to form one of my all-time favorite triangles!