ProfSmudge

Lovely day for a swim

In #MathsToday I drew this line segment, 1 inch long. I asked for a mark for 3/5. A Y11 student drew the mark on the right ('1 is 5/5, 3 is close to 5...'). I then gave him a standard ruler which caused him to draw a new mark, at 0.3. How can a (Higher) student be left with so little understanding?

A grid for sussing Pythagorean triples [scaffolded]

Wow! The BBC bequeathing us an early Christmas

In #MathsToday I worked with two Y11 students. They struggled to 'describe' 4/7 and both thought it was less than 1/2, as here. And they found it challenging to find pairs of numbers that sum to 100, but it was within their reach [excuse my upside down writing].

This is Amazon's customer service, using AI. It appears to understand my issue but wants to take me elsewhere, and at no point did it allow further input from me.

@drrosena.bsky.social This is from my dissembling Labour MP. The Tory council wants to near-double our council tax. Yes, technically this is an increase OF 190% (but not BY), but that is not how we normally express % increase. When prices 'increase by 3%' they are not 3/100 of what they were before.

A gentle trapezium excursion. How are the areas related?

Is it the geometry or the algebra that tells us that (a + b)/2 = a + (b – a)/2 ? [Or is this the wrong question?!]

@sainsburys.bsky.social What is going on here?

Small: 80 tea bags Large: ?

In #MathsToday I was working with a young adult with limited schooling. He struggled with mental arithmetic (he got 27 for 18+10) and explained that he would use a written method instead. This seems extreme, but with our emphasis on formal procedures, is it all that different for some UK pupils?

Four eyes... [why are modern glasses so b-b big?]

Image of a Grammar School classroom, courtesy of the New Statesman. I wouldn't want one of those things to land on my head....

Fraction as measurement.... [Is it 32ths or 32nds?]

I don't understand the price reduction. Mensa is clearly not for me.

Incremental or generic thinking?

An interesting example of responses to a set of fraction comparison tasks using eye-tracking. What implications might it have for helping students to develop fraction sense? [Schwarzmeier et al, 2024]

Introducing The Plough If you've not had enough About issues and stuff.

The moral panic about prisoner release is absurd. If one assumes that prisoners were given the length of sentence that they and society deserve, then it doesn't make sense to reduce the sentence for some but not others.

Labour logic

I pride myself on my bread-slicing skills, except I so often create an overhang.

Look at the pattern. Intriguing or obvious?!

Annoying ad campaign from Amazon