Math Links for Week Ending July 4th, 2014

I love this new video from George Hart. I had the pleasure of meeting George at OAME this year. He presented three speakers ahead of me when we did our Ignite sessions. In this new video he presents seven slide together constructions made from various polygon shapes. I didn't see a link anywhere for the templates so I made my own from screenshots that you can download here.
Curriculum Tags: All
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yq0La4rEarc

I really like this new Jo Boaler video where she tries to give justification on why common core is necessary. The thing I like about it the most is the emphasis on rich open tasks and why those are important for kids to do. Even more so I love the qualification of the different ways the given quadratic growing pattern can physically grow. I think the volcano is my favourite analogy.
Curriculum Tags: Gr7, Gr8, MPM2D, MFM2P
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pOOW0hQgVPQ

If you are doing any work with open questions (see Marian Small for what that is) then this is a nice resource that could give you some insight on how to create them.
Curriculum Tags: All
http://nrich.maths.org/2471

In a recent MaCleans magazine on Canada they had a nice article with a lot of good graphs that could be easily used in any data management class. Check it out
Curriculum Tags: Gr7, Gr8, MBF3C, MDM4U, MAP4C
http://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/putting-canada-on-the-map/

This came across my Facebook feed this week. Jokes are fun but when you can connect them to curriculum then that's even better. For example this one "An infinite number of mathematicians walk into a bar. The first orders a beer, the second orders half a beer, the third orders a quarter of a beer, and so on. … After the seventh order, the bartender pours two beers and says, “You fellas ought to know your limits.”" could be used for Calculus and there is a nice one that could be used when talking about loans in grade 11
Curriculum Tags: MCR3U, MBF3C, MCF3M, MCV4U
http://www.tickld.com/x/20-intelligent-jokes-most-people-wont-get-straight-away-16-is-gold

Imagine that a school built especially for kids who love math
Curriculum Tags: All

http://blogs.kqed.org/mindshift/2014/07/a-school-built-entirely-around-the-love-of-math/

I add this here not because I agree with it but because I do like to show both sides of the story. I do think that drill is needed but the issue here is that you need both a balance of drill and problem solving. But what isn't mentioned is that if you are testing kids on things that you practice by drilling then of course they will do better than kids who were taught more holistically. So I am not sure how valid the study is (despite how much care went into the production of the study)
Curriculum Tags: All
http://www.ajc.com/weblogs/get-schooled/2014/jun/27/want-kids-do-better-math-put-away-group-games-get-/

I think this would be a great challenge. Use your knowledge of quadratic relations to prove this video can't be true. Thanks to Geoffrey Bezaire for this one
Curriculum Tags: MPM2D, MFM2P, MCR3U, MCF3M, MBF3C
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyekCd0g8B8

Another one that came through my Facebook feed. I like this because you could use it in any grade that talks about patterning but especially in grade 10 where you first discover quadratic relations. This is such a simple pattern when you figure it out algebraically and having kids do it manually could be a good catalyst when talking about quadratic relations.
Curriculum Tags: Gr7, Gr8, MFM2P, MPM2D