They show that math really is the language of the universe, and hilarious things happen when you try to translate the universe into English.
Category: Reflections
The Calculus of History
the paper I’d assign to a calculus class if everyone shared my slightly skewed sense of intellectual fun and my excessive fondness for mathematical metaphors
Anxiety, Mathematics, and Words of Kindness
Last April 13th, I emailed a few friends to let them know I was starting a blog. “I’m a little afraid it will land with a dull thud against the hard pavement of the internet,” I wrote. Two weeks later, I posted an essay called What It Feels Like to Be Bad at Math, about … Continue reading Anxiety, Mathematics, and Words of Kindness
A Teaching Philosophy I’m Not Ashamed Of
I’ve always dreaded being asked for my “teaching philosophy.” For years, I gave nonsense or scattershot answers.
Teaching as Self-Sacrifice
But in all this, we risk painting the choice to teach as an act of self-sacrifice. And I believe that view harms our schools more than it helps them.
How to Talk to a Mathematician
In an email, Bonny Becker asks: How do I go about gaining a better understanding of what my math PhD-seeking son is talking about?
Who Cheating Hurts
To lay it plain: Why should I treat my own education as a journey of intellectual discovery, when you just admitted that it’s all about making more money down the road?
Confessions of a Math Major
I majored in math because I wanted people to think I was smart. I chose the math major as a status symbol, a résumé-topper. But that's not my confession.
Undiscovered Math
This blew my mind. The numbers were hiding secret alliances, passing coded messages amongst themselves, and I’d somehow broken inside. I was a number spy.
Blaming the Last Guy
Her teachers have helped and harmed her in a thousand subtle and inseparable ways. How am I to tell the allies from the villains in that complex and shifting tale?
Math with Bad Drawings 