Today in Math class, I showed the kids a Ted Talks video that I posted on the blog back in July of 2010. Here's the link. Go ahead and watch it. I'll wait.
Okay, you're back? This led to some good conversation in the class. The first bit of conversation was a questioned posed by a very astute member of the class, "Are Math books really flawed?" I told them that I don't think the Math curriculum is truly flawed, and that it does teach kids all different kinds of computation. And I told them that I don't think there is anything flawed about what they've done in math class, but that they're going to need to know how to apply the information and learn how to go with the flow when it comes to unknown variables.
We had a nice discussion about the grocery cart problem. When we discussed all of the possible factors, it turns out you don't really know which one could be quicker. And while it would be hard to quantify a practical application to this problem, it did lead to a nice brainstorming session for all of the variables that could make one line better than the other.
Hopefully everyone's papers are ready to be turned in tomorrow. It's like Tax Day for kids.
We had a great day today. Of course, the awesome weather didn't hurt anything either. Let's hope tomorrow is just as beautiful, and that everyone has a great Spring Break!
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