Hope you enjoyed your day off. We teachers, of course, were working hard.

Last month my mom turned 70 (wow!). As my mom loves dance (and so do I) and my dad doesn't, I offered to take my mom out for dinner and to a dance performance - just the two of us. I gave her a list of all the dance performances coming up: Ballet BC, The Nutcracker, a traditional Chinese dancing group, etc. It was a fair bit of shock, then, when she chose (right away!) the following performance from the list:

That's right. Tonight I'm headed out with my mom to see the "Bad Boys of Dance". I can't believe I am being honest right now. Should be... uh... interesting.

Not Canadian data, but assure you it's very similar up here in the Great White North. Check out #2, 3, 4. Want a great job? Get a math (or statistics) degree!!

While you are out having fun, relaxing, sleeping this weekend, I'll be preparing report cards. It's kind of like Midterm Exams for teachers. You know... tons to do and not enough time to do it in.

It's a good time for everyone (you AND me) to take a look at what we have accomplished so far and to ask if there is anything we can do to be more successful second term.

For you, that might mean doing more homework (or doing it on time), or coming for extra help, or studying more for tests / quizzes. For me, it might mean changing how I present information, or how I run the class, or how I assess your understanding of material.

Here's to a successful second term!

By the way, don't feel TOO sorry for me. I have a good reward for my hard work this weekend... two fairly epic concerts on Sunday and Monday night. Do you know / recognize these two gentlemen? They may be old but they are about as big as music stars can be. Thanks to Bijan for scoring me tickets to "The Boss" (the guy on the right).

There's all sorts of different ways to multiply. Here's one that you might find interesting...

This is pretty hypnotic (click the picture at left). After you've watched it for a little while, can you figure out exactly what is going on? What does it have to do with factors? Can you predict what the next number will look like? Do the colours have anything to do with factors? Etc.

Going to see Neil Young on Sunday. VERY excited. I know, I know. He's old. He's not the best looking of guys. And (if you've ever heard him) his voice is not the greatest. But this guy is the best. THE. BEST.

I used to despise him when I was a young. Then, shortly after I graduated from high school, I heard "Cinnamon Girl" on the radio. It was so good I ran out and bought "Decade" - a "best of" album of Neil's. I know this is weird but, after hearing the first few songs, I phoned my friends to bail on a party we were going to, TO STAY AT HOME AND LISTEN TO DECADE OVER AND OVER AND OVER!!!! Wow!

Neil has done everything! Hard rock, grunge, country, folk, techno... He's a music icon, a Canadian hero, a living legend. I've seen him a bunch of times before and he never disappoints. Looking forward to Sunday night...

This is Vi Hart. She is a "recreational mathemusician" (she made that name up for herself) from New York who makes videos about Math. But these are A LOT different than any other math video you've seen before (lots different, for example, than those awful things that YOUR Math teacher makes you watch).

Math teachers have a love / hate relationship with Vi. On the one hand she has made lots of pretty awesome videos about Math-stuff. On the other, she almost always makes sure to bash math-education a little in her videos (it's boring, it's pointless, it's not taught well, etc.). Oh well, she does make some good points at times. And the videos are cool!

I'll post two videos here. The first one is her first math video ever. It looks a little grainy / low budget now, but it's the first one ever so I gotta show you that one. The second one is a more recent effort of Vi's. By the way, if you want (LOTS) more videos like these, click on the picture of Vi Hart above. It'll take you to her website. Happy exploring.

By the way, Vi Hart now works for the Kahn Academy. Do you KNOW about the Kahn Academy? You should! It's the online resource Bill Gates uses to educate his own children. It's completely free and available to YOU!! You can get help with Biology, Physics, Chemistry, and (most importantly) MATH!! Lots and lots (and lots) of videos to watch. Lots and lots to learn. Check it out by clicking the link below...

Imagine I gave you the numbers 25 and 5 and 10 and 8. Could you use those numbers to make the number 29? You can add them, subtract them, multiply them, divide them... but you need to use all the numbers and you need to get the number 29. Can you do it? Could you do it in 30 seconds?

Well, check out the (much tougher) question that this guy solves in 30 seconds. WOW!!

Here's the answer to the question I asked above: [(8)(5) / 10] + 25