I very much like the geometries in this picture. Even if he was studying pre-Calculus.
Month: April 2014
Hailstorm
A long winter is coming to an emphatic end with a series of dramatic spring storms. This hailstorm from April 3rd was one of the most remarkable I’ve experienced.
There was a bit of discussion about just how big the hailstones were. After all, could we say that the hail was the size of golf balls if only the largest were? Or would it be more honest to go with some sort of median or modal size.
Mrs. F. brought out the calipers and a rule for a few of the larger stones.
And I will report that the hail was large enough to put small dents in the roof of my car.
The infra-red satellite image below shows the frontal system that dumped the hail on St. Louis.
The Eggs have Arrived
After waiting an eternity (about two weeks) the Middle School business’ eggs have arrived.
We set up the incubator downstairs in the pre-school/Kindergarden classroom so Mrs. D’s kids will have the chance of monitoring them. The little kids will be responsible for turning the eggs, while the middle schoolers have set up a data logger and a couple temperature probes to keep track of the temperature in the incubator.
The incubator was provided by Ms. Mertz. It’s put together out of plywood with a 75 W incandescent light bulb as the heat source. Unfortunately there is a significant thermal gradient and although we salvaged a couple of computer fans for the purpose we did not get around to installing them –and more importantly testing them– in the incubator before the eggs arrived.
We’ll see how it goes.
Teaching Coding
Vicki Davis has a nice compilation of resources for teaching coding to kids of all ages. Of the fifteen things she lists, the ones I’ve used, like Scratch and the Raspberry Pi have been great.
↬ Ms. Douglass.