December 2011
1 post
Danya and Brittany Final Project Description
Vi Hart comes up with an incredibly intriguing way of thinking about math. Her videos are entertaining and captivating while illustrating a new method to think about the process of math. In short, her videos are a good encapsulation of everything we’ve been doing this semester.
Our project seeks to encompass all of the qualities that Vi Hart illustrates in her videos. One question we wanted to...
November 2011
20 posts
EXP-0022-F Final Project Prompt (for real!) →
Oops! Sorry guys, I posted this originally on my tumblr =/
Let me know if you have any questions!
Dani and Brittany discussing Mindstorms Chapter 6!...
Ch.8 Mindstorms
I am glad that Papert finally addressed the connection between a LOGO environment and schools. I have really enjoyed reading Mindstorms and found Ch.8 to be my favorite chapter to read. I liked is comparison of a LOGO environment to the samba schools. To him, the samba schools were his mathland where math is a real activity and novices and experts are learning together. This type of...
Mindstorms Chapter 8 Response
In Chapter 8 of Mindstorms, Papert finally answers the question that he has been building towards for the entire book: what is the ideal social context in which his type learning might take place? Up until this point, Papert has emphasized and reemphasized his computer culture that moves away from the traditional mathematic one, allowing us to learn (in the traditional sense) as well...
Minsky and Mindstorms Ch. 7
I took Intro to Cognitive and Brain Science last year, and in that class we were introduced to the concept of the “self” being an oversimplified illusion, and not displaying the complexity of what is really going on in the brain. Having been raised with the language of Eastern religions often around me, such as Self with a capital S, this was an interesting thing to ponder, and still...
Mindstorms and Minsky
So I replied to Nick’s e-mail about meeting up to video chat, but I later found, in my spam folder, an e-mail saying the message was not sent (there was a problem because I didn’t use the e-mail address that is on the list for the turtle geometry google group list), so that didn’t work out. We talked about a lot of this in class already, so I will just write a little bit about...
Hey Guys! This is a really cool radio lab about...
Mindstorms 7 + Minsky
Reading the Minsky article in conjunction with the mindstorms chapter made me think a lot about the computerized chess program, specifically “Deep Blue” which was a computer-chess player that ultimately won against the chess champion human. Before finding this out, my instincts were to say that a computer would never be able to beat the best human chess player because of a factor of...
scratch
Here is my attempt at embedding triangles in another shape!
The Great Automatic Grammatizor →
This is a short story by the British author Roald Dahl that I feel captures some of Minsky’s article about machines and creativity. It also captures a socioeconomic aspect of some imagined reality of AI, all wrapped up in a satire. It’s a good read, if you have like five or ten minutes. Anyways, more relevant posts to follow.
Ruby Processing
Once I got ruby processing to work on my computer, I decided to give it a try. I looked over some of the example codes in the Learning Processing with Ruby in order to get a sense of how it worked. I ended up just messing around with the code and changing things in the code to figure out what the code actually meant.
My program creates a square and then everytime you click, it creates another...
Recursion in Scratch
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/ngwoolf/2146678
Here’s my attempt at making a program to simulate recursion in Scratch. I based it off of a project made in scratch that used a similar method to make shapes and animals that kept growing… However, I couldn’t figure out an efficient way to make it keep repeating/growing forever (or at least, for more than 5 steps), as I could only...
Mindstorms Ch. 6 Discussion - Lena and Suzanne
Hi everyone! Our video discussion of Ch. 6 of Mindstorms can be found here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kI0y5x69uPI
I posted this on Monday, but it doesn’t seem to be showing up. Third time’s a charm? We’ll see.
Cheers,
Suzanne
Mindstorms Chapter 6
This chapter of Mindstorms references a lot of the earlier chapters and sort of builds on those ideas. There are also a lot of new ideas that the author introduces, all the while building on the concept and methods of learning.
The author discusses a lot of the different methods of learning, including learning facts versus learning skills. He also brings up the idea of ‘propositional...
Mindstorms Chapter 6 Response
What stood out to me the most in Chapter 6 of Mindstorms was the focus (early on in the chapter) on how computers can be used in to influence the way children learn in a positive manner but, conversely, can also be used in ways that only reinforce our society’s traditional outlook on “real science” versus “school science.” Relating this back to previous chapters in...
Mindstorms Chpt 6
(Sorry again that this is not a video. I hope that is okay. It is difficult to coordinate a time to meet up for the video as I do not really know people in the class that well and groups have already formed to discuss the weekly reading responses.)
This chapter referenced many ideas mentioned in earlier chapters of Mindstorms. The author reflected on the idea that children naturally think about...
Danielle and Hannah Chapter 6 →
Mathland - Nick and Ramzi (The Room)
Our project was modeled after the description that a classmate – Felipe – gave of what his ideal Mathland is. Essentially, Felipe expressed that he wanted math to be more like a casino – both in terms of the probability and random chance aspects as well as the problem-solving feature that plays a role in gambling and specific games available at casinos. In an attempt to emulate and...
Mathland camp To Infinity + Beyond (by Eva,... →
October 2011
100 posts
MusicaLand! The Experience →
This is the actual link to Suzanne, Lena, and James’ Mathland Project. Enjoy!
Mathland Scratch Project: Brittany, Danya, Dani →
This is the scratch portion of our mathland project which incorporates sports (high jump) and math (clearing the bar when solving a math project correctly).
Mathland: Learning Math through Movement
(Brittany, Danielle M., Danya)
We wanted our Mathland to be like playing a sport and designed it for Danielle Pike, who said she wanted math to be more like learning sports where it becomes mindless after you teach your body how to do it. When we were thinking about how to create our Mathland, Dani (Moscovitch) used the example of pole vaulting. When learning to pole vault, a pole-vaulter must...
Our Mathland -- Annie Stella Alex
We did a guess-and-check, “figure-it-out-as-you-go-along” baking project! Annie, who is quite the novice when it comes to baking anything, attempted to make chocolate chip cookies without any recipe. Perhaps simple for some, this actually turned out to be quite the task for rookie Annie, who struggled to decide the best measurements and ingredients. Because she has eaten cookies before she, of...
Nested Triangles
HELP! Agh! While I understand the concepts of 2.4, I am confused about how to actually do it in scratch. I worked on the nest triangles for a while, but alas, its not looking like it should (though at least they are triangles!) I’ll have to think more about this one.
Suggestions?
Mindstorms Ch.5 Response
I definitely agree with Papert that to learn something you need to relate the new material to something you already know and then you have to make it your own or somehow internalize it. I follow this learning pattern when I am learning math and other subjects. As Papert pointed out, math usually requires prerequisites since math concepts build upon each other. This is helpful in that you can...
Ruby and Project Euler
I read some more about Ruby and tried out a couple problems from Project Euler using the repl.it website to test them out.
I started trying to solve problem 10, adding all the primes below 2 million. I made an array and practiced some loops, just to get more comfortable with Ruby. I was having trouble making my nested loops work, but I finally realized that I left off one of the “end”...
Mindstorms Chapter 5
First of all, I really liked this chapter. I thought that Papert brought up a lot of good points and had an interesting perspective. Often times when I read his work I find that I think to myself “of course, that’s obvious” but he really does lay things out in a new way which I really appreciate.
I thought the whole idea of prerequisites was extremely interesting. Prerequisites...
Mindstorms Chapter 4
What was most interesting to me about this chapter was the entire process of debugging. As a person who is not the biggest fan of math, when I was younger I would often just ignore what went wrong when I made a mistake; I was too frustrated that I had made one in the first place. I think that Papert has a lot of logic when he talks about the process of debugging. It is often easiest for people who...
WatchMathland Project Video #3
WatchMathland Project Video #2
WatchMathland Project: Video #1
Ch 5
This chapter was interesting to me because I had an especially hard time learning physics in high school. The author discussed the importance of “finding ways to relate it to something they already know,” which I think is important because as he pointed out, it’s hard to see Newton’s laws in action unless you are in a car skidding on ice. Pappert pointed out that the best way to learn physics...
Triangle Recursion
After reading Ch.2.4 in Turtle Geometry, I decided to give the nested triangles a go in Scratch. I started with a specific length of the side of the first triangle and then divided that in half to get the length of the next triangle and then did that again. I feel like I cheated the program since I hardcoded where the sprite should go, instead of making a variable, but I wanted to make an...
To Infinity and Beyond- Scratch Program
Here is the Scratch program we used at the To Infinity and Beyond math camp:
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/grease1978/2115581
Our Mathland - To Infinity and Beyond!
For out Mathland, we decided to create a “Summer Math Camp” that was more interactive and conceptual than existing “Math Camps”. We filmed a sort of commercial advertisement for the program highlighting activities that can be done at To Infinity and Beyond. The theme for these activities was Circles. Two “students” who were having trouble with math were encouraged to attend To Infinity and Beyond...
MusicaLand
(Suzanne, Lena, and James)
For our Mathland, we tried to create Dani Moscovitch’s idea of musical collaboration, improvisation, and composition. We envisioned a collection of musical loops (percussion, harmony, and melody) that could be played one at a time, played together, or used as the foundation for further composition or improvisation. We did it using Scratch, by assigning each loop to...
Mindstorms Chpt 5
Sorry this is not a video.
I actually agree with a lot of what the author said in this chapter. It struck me when he mentioned the fact that when you look at courses in college course catalogs, you usually see a lot of prerequisites listed. This is understandable, especially for upper level courses, because there is not enough time for the professor to teach all the basics that you may need to...
Ch. 5 Response
I’m home for the weekend so sadly this will have to be a written post this week :(
A lot of things in this reading made a great deal of sense to me. The whole concept of “perquisites” is something that made a lot of sense to me. At Tufts there have been math classes that looked extremely exciting to me, but that I didn’t have the prerequisite for, and I had no interest in...
Improved Turtle Geometry Experiment!
Hey all,
After looking through the polygon vs. star problem during class, I realized I had a similar problem a while ago with a project of mine. I had tried to make this shape:
But I ended up with something like this:
The link to my former project is here.
This is the result that I eventually got:
The link to the new and improved project is here. I thought you had to change the angle...
Mindstorms Ch. 4 Response
I agree with Papert when he proclaims “No knowledge is entirely reducible to words, and no knowledge is entirely ineffable.” When I was reading the beginning of this chapter, I thought immediately of dance rehearsals and how performing arts practices/dress rehearsals are like ‘debugging’. Running through the process in order and seeing which versions of steps work best...
http://scratch.mit.edu/projects/ngwoolf/2100857 →
This is a project I’ve been working on for a few weeks that would an example of my Mathland (or at least part of it). It’s a Monty Hall problem that let’s you try and figure out which of 3 doors a car is behind. I looked up how to do some of the programming for it and looked at other people that made them on Scratch for help.
There’s still some bugs, the biggest being that...
NY Times Article →
Thought this was really cool and somewhat applicable.
Dani and Brittany discussing Mindstorms Chapter 3...
Mindstorms Chpt 4
I think this idea of “developing descriptive languages for talking about learning” is really interesting. When the author pointed out that many people think they should learn physical skills just by doing them, I thought about my own experiences in learning physical activities. I definitely think about learning dance differently than I do learning sports like basketball, tennis, or...
Mindstorms Ch. 3 Response
The comparison to Euclid’s and Descartes’ systems of geometry helped me understand the unique qualities of Turtle Geometry more, but I got stuck when Papert said that the floor turtle and light turtle carry a “powerful idea” in that “Two physically different entities can be mathematically the same (or “isomorphic”).” I think this might be because of...
