Reminiscences

I just finished dumping the rest of my lesson plans.  I guess I held on to the calculus ones for so long because I spent so much time working on them and it was truly a labor of love.  Anyway, I came across this cartoon,  I always tried to lighten the load by adding a little humor to everything I did.

I hope my students are all doing well and have nice memories of our classes.  I miss them all but don’t miss all the other BS that went along with the job.  Retirement is great.

Coming Soon

Thanks to Ricochet for sharing.

How To Handle A Bully

The Nerd In Me Loves This

My wonderful nerdy son found this.

Math and Politics

Washington Post

Gotta Love My Calc Kids

New, on our facebook page.

A Little Math Humor

I don't teach to the test but I do teach test taking skills.  Although I want the kids to know and understand the math, the bottom line is all most care about is their grade.

We just finished a unit on differential equations and with every questions I stress the importance of "plus C", emphasizing that the readers will not even look at their work if they leave that out.  One of my kids just posted the following on our Facebook page.  I'm really going to miss this group.


Two math professors are sitting in a pub. 

"Isn't it disgusting", the first one complains, "how little the general public knows about mathematics?" 

"Well", his colleague replies, "you're perhaps a bit too pessimistic." 

"I don't think so", the first one replies. "And anyhow, I have to go to the washroom now." 

He goes off, and the other professor decides to use this opportunity to play a prank on his colleague. He makes a sign to the pretty, blonde waitress to come over. 

"When my friend comes back, I'll wave you over to our table, and I'll ask you a question. I would like you to answer: x to the third over three. Can you do that?" 

"Sure." The girl giggles and repeats several times: "x to the third over three, x to the third over three, x to the third over three..." 

When the first professor comes back from the washroom, his colleague says: "I still think, you're way too pessimistic. I'm sure the waitress knows a lot more about mathematics than you imagine." 

He makes her come over and asks her: "Can you tell us what the integral of x squared is?" 
She replies: "x to the third over three." 

The other professor's mouth drops wide open, and his colleague grins smugly when the waitress adds: "...plus C."

From One Of My Calc Kids

http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lg8nzv8fEY1qgh99jo1_500.jpg

Math Humor

This one will make you laugh. This comes from 2 math teachers with a combined total of 70 years experience.

This is a strictly mathematical viewpoint....it goes like this:

What Makes 100%? What does it mean to give MORE than 100%?
Ever wonder about those people who say they are giving more than
100%? We have all been to those meetings where someone wants you to
give over 100%. How about achieving 103%? What makes up 100% in life?

Here's a little mathematical formula that might help you answer these questions if:

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

is represented as:

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26.

Then:
H-A-R-D-W-O-R-K

8+1+18+4+23+15+18+11 = 98%

and
K-N-O-W-L-E-D-G-E

11+14+15+23+12+5+4+7+5 = 96%

But,

A-T-T-I-T-U-D-E

1+20+20+9+20+21+4+5 = 100%

And,

B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T

2+21+12+12+19+8+9+20 = 103%

AND, look how far ass kissing will take you.

A-S-S-K-I-S-S-I-N-G

1+19+19+11+9+19+19+9+14+7 = 118%

So, one can conclude with mathematical certainty, that While Hard work and Knowledge will get you close, and Attitude will get you there, it's the Bullshit and Ass Kissing that will put you over the top.

REMEMBER SOME PEOPLE ARE ALIVE SIMPLY BECAUSE IT IS ILLEGAL TO SHOOT THEM.

Math Humor

Pizza, salad, beer and the intenet, I can post this bit of humor my son just sent.

A teacher was arrested today at John F. Kennedy International Airport as he attempted to board a flight while in possession of a ruler, a protractor, a compass, a slide-rule and a calculator.

At a morning press conference, the Attorney General said he believes the man is a member of the notorious Al-Gebra movement. He did not identify the man, who has been charged by the FBI with carrying weapons of math instruction.

"Al-Gebra is a problem for us," the Attorney General said. "They derive solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on tangents in search of absolute values...." They use secret code names like 'X' and 'Y' and refer to themselves as "unknowns", but we have determined that they belong to a common denominator of the axis of medieval with coordinates in every country.

As the Greek philanderer Isosceles used to say, 'There are 3 sides to every triangle'. When asked to comment on the arrest, President Obama said, "If God had wanted us to have better weapons of math instruction, he would have given us more fingers and toes." White House aides told reporters they could not recall a more intelligent or profound statement by the President. It is believed that the Nobel Prize for Physics will follow.

A Little Math Humor

A police officer arrests a man for stealing $2. The judge is not amused and sentences the man to 10 years in prison.

The man thinks.

Then he says, " Judge, it was only $2. Why don't you make it $10 for 2 years. Mathematicians say that the order can be changed without changing the result." The judge says "Seems fair. That is the commutative law of addition. I will commute your sentence to the honor farm and...

here is your $8."

(courtesy of the Hall of Science, Flushing Meadow Park)

The Numbers Do Not LIe

THE NUMBERS DO NOT LIE!!!!!
WHO IS YOUR ROLE MODEL?????
Try it without looking at the answers

1. Pick your favorite number between 1 - 9
2. Multiply your favorite number by 3
3. Then add 3
4. Then multiply by 3 (I will wait while you get the calculator)
5. You should have a 2 or 3 digit number
6. Add the digits together




Now scroll down..........
Now match your number with the number below to see who is your ROLE MODEL on the list below:
1. Albert Einstein
2. Nelson Mandela
3. Margaret Thatcher
4. Tom Cruise
5. Bill Gates
6. Gandhi
7. Brad Pitt
8. Adolph Hitler
9. POd Teacher
10. George Washington


A corny math game. The math is not too hard but the kids might like it and it is a good way to introduce divisibility--it might even be a great ice breaker for the first day.

The Original Super Hero

When we do derivatives and integrals of "e" to the x, I always call "e" the original super hero because whether you integrate it, or differentiate it, you always come back to the same function. It's corny, but it helps the kids remember.

Last week, we were doing a problem in which involved an "e" and I mentioned the super hero story again, when a girl had trouble picking the part of the integral to use for the "u" in her substitution. Calc Boy then yelled out "Ln is e's Kryptonite." Everyone laughed, but I laughed so hard I had tears running down my face. For those of you who don't know the math and are still bothering to read this post, e to the lnx, is x, thus the e is destroyed.

I couldn't believe this boy made the connection. I can't believe the crazy affect I am having on them. This is a kid I will miss.

Math Joke From A Student

I must be doing something right. Here is a joke sent to me by one of my students. They are always thinking math.

Norwegian Math Test for an Engineer

Ole wants a job, but the foreman won't hire him until he passes a little math test. Here is your first question, the foreman said. 'Without using numbers, represent the number 9.' 'Without numbers?' Ole says, 'Dat's easy.' and proceeds to draw three trees.

What's this?' the boss asks. 'Vot! you got no brain? Tree and tree and tree make nine,' says Ole.

'Fair enough,' says the boss. 'Here's your second question. Use the same rules, but this time the number is 99.' Ole stares into space for a while, then picks up the picture that he has just drawn and makes a smudge on each tree. 'Dar ya go.' The boss scratches his head and says, 'How on earth do you get that to represent 99?' 'Each of da trees is dirty now. So, it's dirty tree, and dirty tree, and dirty tree. Dat is 99.'

The boss is getting worried that he's going to actually have to hire this Norwegian, so he says, 'All right, last question.


Same rules again, but represent the number 100.' Ole stares into space some more, then he picks up the picture again and makes a little mark at the base of each tree and says, 'Dar ya go. Von hundred.'

The boss looks at the attempt. 'You must be nuts if you think that represents a hundred!' Ole leans forward and points to the marks at the base of each tree and says, 'A little dog come along and pooped by each tree. So now you got dirty tree and a turd, dirty tree and a turd, and dirty tree and a turd, vich makes von hundred.'
'So, ven do I start?

Top Ten Math Pick-Up Lines

I tell my students, beauty fades, math is forever.

You can tell they believe me, this was sent by the same student that sent me yesterday's essay.

10. You fascinate me more than the Fundamental Theorem of Calculus.
9. Since distance equals velocity times time, let's let velocity or time approach infinity, because I want to go all the way with you.
8. My love for you is like a concave up function because it is always increasing.
7. Let's convert our potential energy to kinetic energy.
6. Wanna come back to my room....and see my 733mhz Pentium?
5. You and I would add up better than a Riemann sum.
4. Your body has the nicest arc length I've ever seen.
3. I wish I was your derivative because then I would be tangent to your curves.
2. I hope you know set theory because I want to intersect you and union you.
1. Would you like to see my log?

A Math Romance

A little math humor--courtesy of a former student. Picture from http://xkcd.com/55/--(he's got some really cute cartoons on the site.)

They integrated from the very point of origin. Her curves were continuous, and even though he was odd, he was a real number. The day their lines first intersected, they became an ordered pair. From then on it was a continuous function. They were both in their prime, so in next to no time they were horizontal and parallel. She was awed by the magnitude of his perpendicular line, and he was amazed by her conical projections. "Bisect my angle!" she postulated each time she reached her local maximum. He taught her the chain rule as she implicitly defined the amplitude of his simple harmonic motion. They underwent multiple rotations of their axes, until at last they reached the vertex, the critical point, their finite limit. After that they slept like logs. Later she found him taking a right-handed limit, that was a problem, because it was an improper form. He meanwhile had realized that she was irrational, not to mention square. She approached her ex, so they diverged.