I Love Math Day Pictures!

We had a great celebration for I Love Math Day 2018.

Our three visitors were brilliant and charming all day long.  Students at every age level enjoyed meeting them.


Sarah Bates, '09
Lillian Meyer, '04
Willow Latham, '05
(See the prior post to learn what they are doing today!)

In every session, students shared some of the exciting things they are doing:  building block structures, making tessellations, playing games, creating posters and demonstrations of math concepts, designing submissions that solve and explain problems.

And they asked questions to guide the sharing from our visitors.

Here are some additional pictures.

Three Mathematical Alumnae Visit Mustard Seed!

We are incredibly fortunate to have three young women visit Mustard Seed on I Love Math Day, February 15.  Our guests all graduated from Mustard Seed and went on to study and work in fields where they could put their quantitative gifts to good use.

Sarah Bates, Class of 2009, went to High Tech High School where she concentrated in Computer Aided Design and Animation.  She continued her studies at Villanova University, earning her Bachelor of Science in Civil Engineering in 2017.  Throughout her college years, Sarah worked with an organization in rural India to explore drought mitigation strategies, including groundwater recharge, rainwater harvesting, and borewells.  Also while a student, Sarah worked on a redesign of the Villanova Train Station for Southeast PA Transport Authority and an agricultural research space on the Villanova campus.  Sarah now works for the Philadelphia Water Department's Green City, Clean Waters initiative, specializing in green stormwater infrastructure.

Willow Latham, Class of 2005, also attended High Tech High School, then Harvard.  She graduated in 2013 with a concentration in Environmental Science and Public Policy.  She is now working on a Joint Degree program combining a Master of Urban Planning from Harvard's Graduate School of Design and a Master of Public Administration from the Kennedy School.   Willow applied her skills for the World Bank in Brazil in the Water Global Practice area, 2014 and 2015.  She worked on a variety of infrastructure programs, including projects for draught management and flood prevention. Closer to home, she worked as a Senior City Planner for Jersey City in 2015 and 2016, leading a master plan update, a resiliency and adaptation plan, and a redevelopment plan for Lafayette Park.  

Lillian Meyer, Class of 2004, loved math and building.  She pursued those interests at the Spence School in NYC, and earned a B.S. in Civil Engineering at Rice University.  After college, Lillian worked at Fugro in Houston, TX as a geotechnical engineer, conducting  offshore investigations and desktop studies to test soil strength for offshore drilling rig foundations.  In 2016 Lillian graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology where she was a Leaders for Global Operations Fellow and earned an MBA and a Masters in Civil Engineering.  As part of her thesis, Lillian helped PG&E model possible corrosion leaks on a steel natural gas distribution pipe.   Now Lillian works for Skanska in the Cost Department on the LaGuardia Central Terminal B Redevelopment Project.

These three young women will spend I Love Math Day meeting with students, talking about their studies and their work, and considering how their love of math has enriched all areas of their lives.  Some key moments during the day:

9:10am -- Our panelists will meet with Thunder and Lightning in the Lightning Room
10:30am -- Grades 6 - 8 in the Community Room
1:15pm -- Meadows, Mountains and Forests in the Community Room

Parents and friends are welcome to join at any time!

More Beautiful, Creative Student Solutions

Today's post shows some additional student work.  Mustard Seed students in grades 6 - 8 are working in teams of 3 to solve difficult problems, and then come up with submissions that demonstrate their thinking, and reveal the kernel of mathematical insight that each problem requires.

A Sixth Grade team decided to build a 3-dimensional model to show all the possible squares that can be created from dots in a 5 x 5 grid (the How Many Squares? problem posted January 15).

After counting the 50 possible squares, the team correctly calculated the area of each square.  For all of the tilted squares, the calculations are not trivial!

The Le Havre to New York problem also led to many creative submissions.

The ship was built by a 7th Grade team.  The Captain's Log in the foreground records the number of ships seen each day.  The last page explains why the total count is 15.  It also explains how to use the lifesavers (actual, edible lifesavers on both the port and starboard sides) to act out the mathematical dynamic of 15 ships meeting on the 7 day voyage.  Brilliant!

Another 7th Grade team produced an essay, then added a wordless 18-second animation to show why the answer needs to be 15.

Le Havre to New York animation 

This is the picture of mathematical elegance.  Again, brilliant!

It is an honor to work with such insightful, thoughtful students.  I wish we could show you all the amazing work being produced in this season!

The Lightbulb Problem -- On or Off?

As you can see from the prior two posts, students are already highly engaged in solving some difficult problems.  They display remarkable persistence and creativity.  (If you haven't already, please look at the prior post for some beautiful student work.)

Here is the problem they are working on now.  This was a favorite of students in past years, so we have brought it back for 2018.  If you have a child in Grades 6 - 8, please discuss it with them.  You will be surprised by their ability to spot patterns, and by their insights:

This problem comes from More Thought Provokers by Doug Rohrer and Joe Spooner, Key Curriculum Press, 1994.

Some Spectacular Student Work!

After students work out the solution to a challenging I Love Math problem, they still have a lot of work to do.  We ask student teams to turn in "submissions" to explain their thinking and convince an audience that their answer is correct.

It is in this submission process that some of the best mathematics lies.  It requires teams to consider the mathematical "key" to solving the problem, and the best way to communicate it to an audience.  It also requires the team to draw on all the creative talents of its members.

The graphic above might just look like a beautiful, colorful design.  However, it is actually the final image in a tremendously fun and creative submission to the How Many Squares? problem (see prior post).  This link takes 85 seconds, and is worth every second.  Enjoy!

How Many Squares? Submission by a 7th Grade Team

Of course, this counting program only answered the first half of the How Many Squares? challenge.  The second part required students to determine the area of each of the 50 squares.  An 8th grade team found a very creative way to use the pythagorean theorem to calculate the areas of the tilted squares.  They submitted a complete slide show, and included this as their final slide:

For students that were not familiar with the pythagorean theorem, there was a more intuitive way to calculate the areas of tilted squares.  Here is how another Eighth Grade team described it:

You might be interested in the solution to the second problem in the prior post, Le Havre to New York.  An Eighth Grade team turned in a beautiful solution using only two slides:

To see more great student work, keep visiting the blog in the coming weeks.  And visit Mustard Seed School on February 15 -- I Love Math Day!

I Love Math Season 2018

I Love Math season has begun again.  Already students are working on two challenging problems, the first of four they will do to prepare for I Love Math day. I Love Math day will be celebrated on Thursday, February 15.  (This is because February 14 is Ash Wednesday, so our mathematics celebration will be delayed by one day.)

Here is the first problem:

Here is the second:

We hope that students will discuss these problems with parents and friends.  They are meant to be enjoyed, and every problem will contain interesting mathematical insights appropriate for middle school students.

What are the rules?  Students may do anything a mathematician would do!
Ask a parent for help?  Of course!
Ask an expert?  Would a mathematician do that?  Of course!
Research on the internet?  Yes!

The one thing a mathematician would never do is present some else's work as their own.  Each team, and each student, must "own" the work they turn in.  They are expected to explain and articulate the ideas in their submissions. 

Come back soon for the next problems!