mathematics

Over the years I’ve written up quite a number of blog posts about the math activities we do homeschooling. Here is an easy index to the posts.

Origami math:

Minecraft Math:

Math books:

Many more math ideas:

Math Teacher’s at Play blog carnival:

#56
#72

My list of games (including lots of math games) are on my game index. And if you want you can browse through just blog posts tagged with “mathematics“

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Christy's Houseful of Chaos

17 hours ago

Could you help me out? If you've read either of my books, please consider reviewing them on Amazon or Goodreads. If you enjoy what I write on Facebook, consider recommending my page or books on Facebook or sharing them with friends. Thank you! ... See MoreSee Less

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Christy's Houseful of Chaos

23 hours ago

(The following is something I wrote a few years ago.)I am reading right now a book about the history of the United Farmers and Farm Women of Alberta in 1909 - 1921. I read it reflecting both on how I can include bits of its history in the book I'm working on and also on how they organized successfully.Before the UFA there were two organizations. The AFA (Alberta Farmers Association) and the S of E (Society of Equity). When in 1905 both groups presented separate to the Tariff Commission the AFA used talk of the freedom of trade while the S of E spoke in terms of capitalists and labour. Both were trying to argue for the same platform, but from different perspectives.When the two organizations joined together to be the UFA they included a mix of people. Many farmers worked as wage labourers sometimes and many farmers were accustom to hiring others. So the organization had times where resolutions were put forward arguing on either side, and there were always some people disappointed.However, the group grew partly by focusing on small things. They sold binder twine, worked to get roads open, worked to extend where the telephone lines reached, helped out when one another were sick or injured. They worked for small changes. I'm sure that would have ticked off a lot of people who would have thought they should have focused on the big things. They did want to deal with big things too.I think about this now reflecting on organizing for change - something I haven't done in a few years now. When I was involved, there were always people who were frustrated that our victories were just small symptomatic victories - bandage solutions, that helped a few people. Yet those bandage solutions were the types of things that helped grow the UFA. They were winnable. If the UFA had just focused on the (at least temporarily) unobtainable things they wouldn't have been able to grow the movement large enough to make the change they wanted. Many participants in the UFA had a strong class awareness and advocated for class changes, but if they had rejected people of other classes (mainly the upper class) they wouldn't have been able to grow the movement. Of course one can't focus on growing a movement to the point where one forgets what the movement was about, but by focusing on the little changes they could have victories, rejoice in those and show others that the group is worth being part of. ... See MoreSee Less

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Christy's Houseful of Chaos posted a video to playlist Outschool Teachers.

1 day ago

In this video #outschool teacher Kelly McGrath explains why she teaches math with a focus on patterns of nature. I love her last few lines about how people make a mistake when they portray math as something people need to know to pay their bills, when math is about so much more. ... See MoreSee Less

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Christy's Houseful of Chaos

2 days ago

Curious about what we talk about in my secular Bible studies classes? In last Friday's class we looked at the stories of Moses' infancy in the Bible and in the writing of Philo of Alexandria and Josephus (two first century Jewish sources). Philo describes the act of putting Moses in the basket on the river as one of abandoning a child. The parents grieve that they are losing him and that they have prolonged everyone's suffering by not exposing him (to the elements to die) as soon as he was born. Josephus, on the other hand, describes Moses' parents as having been promised Moses' success in a dream ahead of time, and so they put Moses in the basket as a way of commending him to God's care rather than relying on their own limited ability to protect him.Philo and Josephus also disagree on why the Egyptian king wanted to kill the babies in the first place. Philo stays closer to the Biblical text in saying that the king is worried about the growing population of foreigners. Josephus says it because the king has been warned of a prophecy about what a specific boy will do, and so he tries to kill all the boys to prevent that specific boy from growing up.Josephus' text has close parallels with Matthew's infancy story of Jesus, where Joseph has been told in a dream to marry Mary, and where king Herod kills the baby boys of Bethlehem in an effort to kill the one boy he has heard prophecies about.My secular Bible studies classes are neither an attempt to covertly convert people nor an attempt to mock or degrade the Biblical text. Rather we look at different interpretations (both ancient and modern scholarly interpretations). We talk about potential origins of the stories and political implications. (Did Josephus' focus on one prophesied baby help make the risk the Egyptians faced not something the Romans might also worry about in Josephus' time?) ... See MoreSee Less

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Christy's Houseful of Chaos

2 days ago

Beautiful, isn't it? ... See MoreSee Less

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