Batting Average

If A-Rod got a hit 4 out of 7 times on the first two games, what does he need to get on the third game to move his batting average up to at least a .750. Is it possible to do this on the next game?

Difficult Time

Why do students have a difficult time with math?

Real Life

How will you use math in real life?

poll: who was the most responsible for the Holocaust?

by Andy

I asked people to respond to who was the most responsible for the Holocaust. The first option was Hitler. The second was the entire German population. This includes people who did nothing and people who supported the Nazis. The next group was the entire world that did little to stop the Holocaust. The final group was the Nazis who followed Hitler.
People found the Germans responsible. The main reason was that they believed that the Germans had the power to elect Hitler and they did nothing to stop him. The second highest group either blamed Hitler or the Nazis who followed him. The people who blamed Nazis said that they hated the Jews and were looking for a man like Hitler. The people who blamed Hitler said that he brainwashed the people.

The reason this matters is that genocide continues and it can happen again. Knowing who is responsible will shape how we handle it in the future. If this is true, maybe there is hope. Maybe Americans will believe it is the entire nation's responsibility and they'll do something to stop it.

statistics are misleading

by A.S.

When I first looked at the statistics of World War II, I was shocked. Nearly twice as many civilians died as soldiers. (47 million civlians compared to 25 million soldiers) It would seem, then, that it's probably safer to be a soldier than a civlian. My group discussed this for awhile. Maybe it's because soldiers are armed and civilians aren't. Maybe it's just that the war was a total war and was fought in civilian land. Was it because of the bombing of factories? accidental bystandars? Was it the inflated numbers because of the Holocaust?

Then it begins to make sense. Most likely, only about ten percent of a nation's population was soldiers. If women couldn't fight, that makes it half. If the elderly and the young can't fight, it drops that half by another half and then, of the twenty five percent who can, less than half actually go to the battlefield.

So, if ninety percent of the people are civlians and 47 million die that's a much lower percentage than the twenty-five million soldiers who died. In that case, it's actually much safer to be a civlian.

Why does this matter? Because people quote stats all the time. But maybe there's more to the picture. The more data you have the bigger the picture you can draw. The biggest issue is to remember to ask questions. Don't take someone's statistic at face value.

a poll: what issue should the president focus on first?

The following is a survey about the elections, with a short write-up afterward.

Question #1: If you were president what would you take care of first?
It was very interesting to see other people's viwepoints. Immigration was a big one, which wasn't much of a shock. I was not surprised that the economy was considered important, but I was surprised that Global Warming was so important. I also interviewed people about which candidate they would support, which was more interesting to me.

Does Math Matter?

When I was a kid, I did math problems with no idea how I would actually use math in life. To me, it was just about doing enough to pass the test. So, the question I offer students, is "how is math useful in life?"

Now, as an adult, I find myself using math all the time. When I have multiple guests over for a birthday party, I multiply fractions in recipes. When I go on a road trip, I use algebra to estimate milage. When I try and figure out my paycheck (as small as it might be) I use decimals and percentages.