Thursday January 12 How to Make Math Count Molloy College

Mondays in January & February AMTNJ Free Online Engage Series

With the Winter Solstice approaching in the Northern Hemisphere, this collection of over 2000 microphotographs can help us appreciate the beauty of the season. The images "reveal the wonder of nature's diversity in uniformity: no two are alike, yet all are based on a common hexagon."

Vermontian Wilson Bentley received a microscope for his 15th birthday from his mother. Looking at snow crystals, he "was amazed at their beauty, complexity, and variety. He tried to make detailed drawings of magnified snow crystals, but the snow melted before he could finish." It took him a few years, but in 1885 at age 19, he made the world's first microphotograph of a snow crystal. His story was shared in the Caldecott Award winning children's book Snowflake Bentley.

Bentley Digital Collection online

Imagine using the Sun to learn more about Math. In late October, the University of Maine unveiled "the SunRule, which was invented by associate professor of mathematics education and instructional technology Justin Dimmel and associate professor of mathematics education Eric Pandiscio." which teaches Math using rays of sunlight.

“The SunRule helps users see multiplication as a continuous, stretching concept, providing a strong foundation for the ideas of ratio, scaling and slope that are critical to help students build necessary math skills as they progress through school grades”.

The project was funded through MIRTA (Maine Innovation Research and Technology Accelerator) that helps to develop new products that may lead to job creation and grow Maine's economy.

Video from News Channel Maine

The General Council on Weights and Measures met in Paris in November and decided on 4 new prefixes for very large and very small numbers. Some prefixes are widely known such as kilo- (1000), centi- (.01) and mega- (which actually = 1,000,000 but communicates hugeness).

According to Scientific American, "By the 2030s, the world will generate around a yottabyte of data per year—that’s 10^24 bytes, or the amount that would fit on DVDs stacked all the way to Mars.". This rapid growth of data prompted the metric governing body, the BIPM (aka the International Bureau of Weights and Measures), to define a set of new very large and very small numbers.

Please see the image below and/or check out this link for more info.

Click on this link for the December Brain Puzzler

For the answer to November's Brain Puzzler click here.

Thanks, Robin the Math Lady Schwartz

www.mathconfidence.com