Making Math Cool with Ms R's Class

Today's guest post is courtesy of author Gillian O'Reilly, author of The Great Number Rumble and Slangalicious.

This is Pascal's Triangle, created by the amazing Grade 3/4 students in Nancy Rawlinson's class at Davisville Public School in Toronto:

Pascal's Triangle is pretty cool. Each number in the triangle is made from adding the two numbers above it, but the intriguing aspect is all the other patterns that you can find: regular ordinal numbers (1, 2, 3, 4...); triangle numbers (1, 3, 6, 10, 15...); multiples of 11; powers of 2 and even Fibonacci numbers.

Nancy Rawlinson was one of the people who advised Cora Lee and me when we were writing The Great Number Rumble: A Story of Math in Surprising Places (where you can read more about Pascal's Triangle). I love hearing about all the wonderful ways she teaches math to her students and shows them that there is math all around us. When she taught Grade 6, one of her skeptical students finally admitted three-quarters of the way through the year, "I give up. Math IS everywhere!"

Ms Rawlinson's students created all the elements of the triangle and posted questions around it based on the 5 Ws: Who, What, Why, When and Where. It's on the bulletin board outside their class for all the school to see.
Answering all these questions gave even the less enthusiastic math students an avenue into some of the cooler parts of math. And I have to admit that, as a kid myself, it was the weird and cool bits of math that I always remembered best.

Ms Rawlinson says her students loved the idea of growing patterns and they loved hearing the history of Pascal's Triangle. They also were intrigued by the idea that things can be named after people who didn't really discover them. While Blaise Pascal gave his name to it, the idea of the triangle first began with Chinese mathematicians, was further developed by Indian and then Arab scholars and then brought to Europe. Even though a number of European mathematicians were working on it, Pascal took the credit.

Next up on Ms Rawlinson's class calendar is Fibonacci numbers, named after the Italian mathematician who also brought the concept of zero to Europe. Were Fibonacci numbers actually discovered by Leonardo Fibonacci? Ms Rawlinson's class can tell you the answer!

Children's Authors Win Big at Physics Conference

Last month, authors Cora Lee and Gillian O'Reilly traveled to Portland, Oregon, to accept an American Institute of Physics writing award for their book The Great Number Rumble. Congratulations, Cora and Gillian! Here's Cora's account of their trip:

Come join the circus... or maybe a physics conference?

The American Institute of Physics and the American Association of Physics Teachers does controlled chaos quite well, juggling hundreds of sessions, workshops, committee meetings and receptions as well as, literally, balls in the air (more on that below). How would two writers know? We were there--last month we traveled to Portland, Oregon to receive our AIP Science Writing Award for The Great Number Rumble, and to speak on a panel discussion on publishing science in popular forms. When we weren’t needed, we peeked into various conference venues.

Highlights? Getting the award, of course. But also: surviving the panel discussion without a microphone... watching unicycles and contortionists, jugglers and jokesters in their Physics of Vaudeville show... overhearing a request for The Great Number Rumble and The Great Motion Mission at Powell’s, Portland’s humongous bookstore!

 Left to right: Philip W. Hammer, PhD, Associate Vice President, Physics Resources Center, American Institute of Physics; Cora Lee, author; Gillian O'Reilly, author.

Math for Mom and Me

A little rambling on my roots: I rarely think about the fact that my ancestry is Chinese, but recently there’s been some excitement surrounding that culture. The Olympics? Maybe for some. But for me, it was the arrival of the Complex Chinese version of The Great Number Rumble in my mailbox, and on its heels, the news of an impending deal for Simplified Chinese rights.

Finally, I can show my mother what I spent almost all of my spare time doing the last 3 years! Her English is bare bones, and my Chinese is … well, let’s call it immature (to give me some credit, I found the character for my last name easily enough)…so our conversations are rather limited in their scope and depth. I showed her the North American and Korean editions, but this one’s different – she’ll actually be able to read it! So that takes care of one mystery for her. Now to explain what I do with the rest of my life: how does one say “regulatory documentation for the biopharmaceutical industry” in Chinese?

Cora Lee

author of The Great Number Rumble

Why did the Möbius strip cross the road?

Image by David Benbennick taken on March 14, 2005.

Last Thursday, I met with 36 Grade 4 students from Ms von Blerk’s class and Ms Schachter’s class at Westmount Park Public School in Montreal (a school that looks like a castle!). Nico and Max, who are homeschooling, attended the presentation too. We talked about the weird and cool parts of math and played with Möbius strips. The kids were great – polite and full of questions.

A couple of their questions stumped me! So I looked up the answer to "How did Pierre Fermat, creator of Fermat’s Last Theorem, die?" The encyclopedia didn’t say how he died but it did say that, in 1637, he scribbled in a book that he had a proof for his theorem . He didn’t die until 28 years later, but he still hadn’t written down the proof in a place where people could find it. Talk about not getting your homework done!

My presentation was part of an ongoing science program run by the excellent Montreal Children’s Library, a non-profit institution that has been providing free library service since 1929. Thanks to MCL Science Coordinator Josie Baker for setting up the event. And a big thank you to Librarian Elizabeth Macdonnell, Robin, the teachers and all the kids for making an author feel so welcome – and to the two students who volunteered to draw on and cut Möbius strips.

Here’s a joke for you all:

Why did the Möbius strip cross the road?

To get to the other....???!!!

Gillian O'Reilly

author of Slangalicious and The Great Number Rumble

A New Holiday? Yes, math can be everywhere!

When Cora Lee and I wrote The Great Number Rumble: A Story of Math in Surprising Places, my friend and math-teacher-extraordinaire Nancy Rawlinson gave us lots of useful advice. Last Friday, March 14, Nancy turned up at my house with a lovely, freshly-baked pie. Why? Because it was Pi Day!

Pi Day? Yes, it's the third month and the fourteenth day -- 3/14. And what is pi? 3.14 approximately.

Nancy had wanted to celebrate Pi Day with her students but it's March break in Ontario, so she she thought of her fellow pie and math enthusiast -- and my family got a delicious dessert that disappeared faster than you can say "irrational number."

For those of you who really love math, the pie was unveiled just before 2:00 o'clock -- 1:59 to be precise. Can you guess why?

Gillian O'Reilly