• Tues 12/5
    clicker (final project ideas: sacred geometry, spiritual numeracy)
    Discuss how to research mathematical connections and people for a number of class interests, including equations, geometry, algebra, finance, statistics, probability, Mactutor, mathematicians, mathematicians research soccer, Encyclopedia of mathematics and society, Science in Context, Mathematical Sciences Databases---JSTOR
    Beauty of Mathematics, http://vimeo.com/77330591 [1:41]
    mathematical breakthroughs, scientific truth, Flat earth headline
    Film by Kaitlyn Colucci, Final Exam Research Presentations, rubric.
    Course evaluations
    research for final project

  • Mon 12/4 class stats & what is mathematics lab
  • Thur 11/29 Test 3

  • Tues 11/28
    Review. 2016 presidential election, pre- and post-election views
    What is Mathematics slides. Final Exam Research Presentations, rubric, What are some topics you might be interested in?
    Real-World Problems Being Solved by Mathematicians
    Math It's Everywhere [1:04].
    Work on study guide

  • Mon 11/27
    1. Birthday simulation
    2. Statistics Detective Lab
    3. Sell your stock
  • Tues 11/21
    Clickers for regression lab, predictors
    Clickers review
    Probability and Randomness in Games, Business, and Life I The Great Courses up until 4:00. [notice the connections to the first two sections]
    probability slides and birthday comic, birthday simulation--try the number of people in our class.
    What are some factors that may invalidate independency?
    Which would you choose? David Blackwell and controversy of Friend or Foe Prisoner's Dilemna, Tragedy of the Commons
    TEDxBlackRockCity - Spencer Greenberg - Improve Your Life With Probability start with 1:42
    Benford's Law where the first digit in many real-life sources of data is not equally distributed, and approximates a logarithmic trend (where 1 occurs about 30% of the time while 9 less than 5% of the time) in data such as street addresses, stock prices, population numbers, death rates, etc... Identity theft, fraudulent election in Iran faked economic data, cooked accounting books.
    The 2016 presidential election

  • Mon 11/20 Can We Predict the Future? Stocks, Class Data, and Raw Egg Regressions
  • Thur Nov 16
    GE experiment
    Here is a second application of all we've been reading and discussing. Critique the following article (pros and cons). Informal bullet points are fine here: Exposure to letters A or F can affect test performance
    Look at succeeding in mathematics (Circle lots of As): Here's Good News... SAT scores are declining at a slower rate. Review the biased MRT instructions and relate to stereotype vulnerability.
    Regression line Average GPA = .539 + .00362 (Verbal SAT) [600, 800], a 4.0 GPA? SAT scores to college GPA [An Investigation of the Fit of Linear Regression Models to Data from an SAT Validity Study By Jennifer L. Kobrin, Sandip Sinharay, Shelby J. Haberman, and Michael Chajewski]
    Discuss correlations versus causations on why birds fly south during colder weather
    Bradford-Hill criteria, including the controversy of 1994
    Does volume predict high? Discuss lab on Monday. jump, experiment, protect!. If there are any eggcidents, clean up and I need the mesh back.
    Begin Birthday
    Case studies: College Success analyze studies

  • Tues Nov 14
    Review confidence interval and #6, Study: 70% of Facebook users only read the headline of science stories before commenting, percentage who only read headlines
    probability continued
    Book connections to the articles
    Predicting the future! Put equation of line on the board, review the regression slide
    2000 election between Bush and Gore and Pat Buchanan's impact in Florida, butterly ballot
    Excel hours without sleep and midterm errors, pdf, extrapolation
    November 11 is Veterans Day.
    Would you have been drafted for Vietnam in the 1969 draft?
    Is there anyone in the class with the same birthday?
    Begin the 1969 Vietnam draft [2:39-5:00] December 30, 003. Roger Mudd. data, scatterplot, line of best fit, and boxplots 195, Starr, A truly unbiased military draft, methodology
    Project 3, rubric, full criteria
    Create a video

  • Mon Nov 13 Gallup Poll
  • Thur Nov 9
    clicker questions
    probability
    HIV testing
    articles on the impact of young voters in the 2008 Presidential election
    Clicker questions on elections, Project 3, Book connections to the articles, Create a video
    probability of appalachian state football winning

  • Tues Nov 7
    Review mean, median, boxplots, and confidence intervals.
    Clicker review of mean, median, boxplot and confidence intervals.
    Music choices and compatibility issues (measuring "difference" in music tastes via looking at vertical distance between points--least squares) music 1, music 2.
    Begin inferences and regression.
    Predicting height and solving a crime. SAT and GPA.
    deciding public policy: price of a life
    Review the Representations of Data Lab via clicker questions and by #20

  • Mon Nov 6
    1. Stock Purchase
    2. Representations of Data Lab
  • Thur Nov 2
    Clicker questions on the homework
    Review measures of central tendency and boxplots
    Nielsen
    Worst graph intro, worst graphs cover.
    penny experiment
    Media Literacy Week. p. 663 #15 or 18
    Project 3, rubric, grade average
    real-life applications of boxplots
    confidence intervals
    Last Week Tonight with John Oliver - Misleading Food Labeling [5:12]

  • Tues Oct 31 measures of central tendency
    Problem solving at the heart of mathematics: visualization, generalization, making decisions, Nightingale, Gallup, Silver
    Distance from home bar chart.
    Discuss bar chart of volume of stocks from lab including how you can tell whether the mean will be above or below the median using the idea of a scale balance.
    box plots
    Height box plots.
    Armspan bar chart.
    Psychic experiment. Histogram of the ASULearn random number from 1 to 10.
    Truth and Consequences: Random number experiment. The expected value if equally distributed from adding the people in the class and dividing by 10. Discuss whether the human mind can provide a random number. Discuss sampling versus census. Discuss mathematical proof versus statistical significance and randomness. Discuss the expected value (sum/10) and briefly mention the chi test [(B2-C2)^2/C2, CHITEST(B2:B11,C2:C11)] and p-value (are the observations statistically significant or can the differences be ascribed to random variations of chance?).
    Golden mean analysis
    Connection between Escher and tiling in the geometry segment and the statistics of nature: the golden mean/phi and plants, flowers and pinecones: doodling in math class [6:13].

  • Mon Oct 30 Collecting data:
    1. Stock Graph and Data Collection
    2. ASULearn: Anonymous Class Data Collection
    3. Statistics of Nature
    4. Read through the exam 2 discussion forum posting on ASULearn
  • Thur Oct 26 Test 2

  • Tues Oct 24
    Compare #4 with a neighbor. Take questions on the others.
    Mention hw for Monday.
    themes, Test 2

  • Mon Oct 23 Car Purchases: Decisions, Decisions (Part 2)
  • Thur Oct 19
    credit card statement finance charges=monthly interest=interest paid that month. Credit ratings, stores selling their credit cards by their employees, risk and interest rate, credit vs debit cards.
    Connections between finance and geometry of the earth and universe via Richard Feynman quotation. U.S. National Debt Clock : Real Time.
    Discuss upcoming hw for before and after the exam. finance.yahoo.com to create a Berkshire Hathaway stock graph (BRKA versus BRK-A).
    loan payments and amortization and themes.

  • Tues Oct 17 Clicker loans
    Which option would you choose?
    Student loan statement
    Review prohibitions against charging interest on money to members of the community (usury), but was ok for strangers - lending was considered philanthropy and part of a giving back to the community... Payday lender in Boone clicker
    Introduce the theme of unintended consequences and pay attention to the appearance of North Carolina here: Stop at 15:28 (Rich Guy's Car): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDylgzybWAw. Truth is in algebra and in details of the derivations, in lending practices, John Oliver exposing truth, in real-life issues like lottery winners ending up worse financially after 5 years, or a high probability in ending up in the circle of debt in a payday loan. numerous conclusions made from the same measurements. risk in finance and lending.

  • Mon Oct 16 Condo and Car Purchases: Decisions, Decisions (Part 1) lab
  • Tues Oct 10
    Clicker review of lump and periodic combined
    loan payments and amortization
    Modify the Excel file 58.18, 4795, .08/12, 120 months in B3 and D3. Rounding so change B3 to 58.18 exact. Scroll down to month 120 to see the impact of rounding.

  • Mon Oct 9 Use lab time to work on Project 2 or review lump sum and periodic.
  • Thur Oct 5
    slides, Philosophy of derivation of periodic payment
    Jane - Traveled Early and then Saved. Joan - Saved Early and then Vacationed.
    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mike-branch-cfp/should-you-say-yes-to-you_b_5889992.html
    pension decisions
    Take questions on Ben Franklin project or the hw.
    Begin the lottery questions. Search google news for lottery winner lump.
    Picture of Excel work, Excel work file. Picture of Excel solutions, Excel solution file.

  • Tues Oct 3 Clicker questions for lump sum #5-7
    Project 2, sample beginning
    What about $100 deposited every month into an account for 25 years, compounded monthly at 5%? slides Work towards periodic payment understanding and compare the philosophy to the lump sum formula derivation and to Jeff Weeks.
    Clicker questions for lump and periodic
    $37 problems

  • Mon Oct 2 Benjamin Franklin's Will: Lab
  • Thur Sep 28
    Clicker questions for lump sum #1-4. Go over hw.
    Review the lump sum philosophy
    Charlie Rose - An exclusive conversation with Warren Buffett [first 54 seconds and then from 3:30-5:18].[DVD 4:11 - 5:48] Youtube first 1:27
    Lisa's Thrifty Savers savings account from Bart the Fink: Excel can't solve the resulting lump sum equation for number of times compounding per year. constructing a solution versus empirical guess and check.
    Quotes on taxation. Local to global taxes.
    $37. Discuss lab and project.

  • Tues Sep 26 clickers on the history and ethics of charging interest #1-3.
    Truth in equations. Comic [actually Benjamin Franklin].
    Discuss 142 years compounding monthly versus annually. Platonic equations. Latin Id quod inter est or "that which is between."
    Lump Sum Philosophy
    clickers on the history and ethics of charging interest #4 and 5
    Discuss other possibilities for unknowns in lump sum - the time length, the rate, or the number of times compounding per year. Intro to Goal Seek and Solver in Excel via seeing how long it will take to double our money using her rate, and then today's rate:
    =1000*(1+B2/12)^(C2*12)
    Start with B2=.08, C2=1
    Goal Seek: Data/What-If Analysis/Goal Seek/Set cell... a1, 2000, c2...

  • Mon Sep 25 equations, fractions, percentages, interest and course average % lab
  • Thur Sep 21 Test 1
  • Tues Sep 19
    Review the Universe Lab and clicker questions
    Geometric visualization, algebraic, and statistical perspectives related to Down with Fractions
    Historically multiples of 1/100 were common in taxation and computations. The decimal version came much later [.01, 1%], % symbol and "out of 100".
    # stars will come up again in the finance segment. another connection between the two: Plimpton Cuneiform 322 and interpreting data engagement
    themes and study guide. advice from previous students
    Take questions on test 1

  • Mon Sep 18 The Geometry of Our Universe Lab
  • Thur Sep 14
    Discuss the Jeff Weeks video.
    Truth via reproducibility and consensus.
    Experiment: Rob Kirschner's Supernovae results related to whether brightness=1/distance2. Distant supernovae dimmer than expected. Critiques: Experimental error, no perfect model, not necessarily exploding at the same brightness, convenience sample
    Geometry of the Universe
    Experiment: Discuss the density equation WMAP and Planck launches. Critiques: difficulty agreeing on the meaning of the data, neutrino mass, dark energy, speed of light?
    Clicker questions on last part of project 1
    Discuss the Jeff Weeks interview
    My scholarship
    Discuss equations in this segment.
    Down with Fractions. Geometric visualization, algebraic, and statistical perspectives.

  • Tues Sep 12
    Klein bottle tic-tac-toe
    Clicker questions on 4.6. Experiment 1: Gauss and Lobachevsky's measuring the angle sum. Critiques: Experimental error, light rays bend with gravity, triangles too small
    Clicker review of some of project 1 and continue with the last 3 questions of Project 1.
    Clicker question on 4.7
    3-torus with only 96 stars and other ideas about the number of stars
    A spherical universe: What sequence (over time) would we see if a hypersphere passed by us? Think about an analogue of a sphere passing by a 2-D creature's plane of existence. Hint: A sequence of spheres - how do they change? hypersphere visually, algebraically, in AI, biology, machine learning and statistics, and in Einstein's theory of relativity. hypersphere
    NASA and flat universe. finite? Portal trailer and Futurama: I, Roommate. Escher. Experiment: Looking for repeated star patterns-Critiques: light takes times to reach us and changes the view, recognize?
    Hyperbolic universes: Hyperbolic Icosahedral

  • Mon Sep 11 2D Universes Lab
  • Thur Sep 6 Collect and begin going over the first 4 questions from Project 1. Diverse perspective and local to global issues. The role of chance and probability in knowing the truth. Begin to discuss the last 3 questions, which we will continue to go over. Dimensions of our universe. Experiment: Is the Universe a 2D Hologram? light rays, string theory Sampling estimates and the role of chance and probability in creating a good sample and extrapolation.

  • Tues Sep 5
    Clicker questions on dimensions and 2-D universes
    probability
    Selections from PBS Life by the Numbers [~32 min]
    books in my office for research project 1, rubric
  • Thur Aug 31
    applications of hyperbolic geometry
    Difference of hyperbolic geometry and spherical geometry:
    Sphere with Angels and Devils, 1942.
    Sphere Surface with Fish. 1958
    Another surface: PacMan sequence from Futurama (Anthology of Interest II) and a tiling view versus folding up the space (where PacMan would see his back which would look like a piece of a circle or a flat line to him).
    Klein bottle identifications of the square and Glass model. Tiling view and Klein bottle Tic-Tac-Toe to the left and right (same board), and above and below (reflected board).
    Watch an excerpt from Flatland: The Movie. What do you think spherius would say to the idea of a 4th dimension? What if a donut passes by Arthur?
    Where is North?

  • Tues Aug 29
    Questions or comments on the homework.
    Clicker questions and other activities on angle sum, parallels, and Pythagorean theorem. Local to global.
  • Pythagorean theorem and Image of Pythagorean theorem
    Clicker questions for lab 1

  • Mon Aug 28 Perspective Lab Activities and ASULearn Mathematical Experiences reflection survey
  • Thur Aug 24 Clicker question on round earth. Press the On/Off (power) button on their iClicker remote until the blue Power light begins flashing (about 2 seconds). Press the new two-letter code AA.
    Take questions or comments on the syllabus or on project 1.
    Discuss the lab (and reading) for Monday via Perspective Drawing and Projective Geometry. Discuss Excel.
    Review geometry segment themes: What does a space look like, how do we know and how do we represent it?
    clicker cartoon question, cartoons and dimensions
    Are The Simpsons 2D or 3D?
    Dutch graphic artist M.C. Escher and the mathematical clues he left in his work:
    Sun and Moon.  
    Worksheet on Escher.   (number 2).
    Folding a Euclidean angle sum and Walking an angle sum
    Quotes from Escher on how he does mathematics and where it comes from.

  • Tues Aug 22 Overview of the course including the attendance policy. What kind of world are we making. What kind of world should we be making. What kind of world can we be making.
    Discuss How could we tell that the earth is round instead of flat without using any modern technology (ie if we were ancient Greeks)? Make a list of ideas on the board. Watch 10 minute video excerpts and prepare to share something to discuss: Life By the Numbers Shape of the World (maps of the earth) and Seeing is Believing (perspective)
    lifebynumbersintro.mov notes. Highlight the questions of what our world looks like, how we know, and how we represent it. Highlight Danny Glover's discussion that the earth is finite but has no edges, that a flat map of the earth must contain some distortion, and Sam Edgerton's views that perspective led to the industrial revolution, that perspective is learned - not innate, and that we must distort the work to give the illusion of depth.

    Julian Beever's pavement drawings:
    Butterfly
    Globe wrong view
    Globe correct view
    Accident
    I decided to get into 3D after seeing the effect of tiles being removed from the street, and later trying to recreate the sense of depth in a drawing. Once I realised you could make things go down, I realised you could make them appear to go up and I began experimenting.
    advice from previous students