Source of the Week: magic square with negative numbers

With the year 6 SATs and another half term in mathematics to get by there never been a better time to some studies and puzzles. One of my favorite topics is the magic square, as it can be incredibly simple or extremely complex. This special magic square is quite challenging when it comes to adding positive and negative numbers, so it is a good check to see if children trust dealing with negative numbers

To convert the numbers in the squares is given on all three magic squares and on the first puzzle there is an indication that each row, column and diagonal adds up to-3.

One of the best strategies to use with this is to work out what the number should be and what the total for each row etc should be. It is also a good idea to cut out small squares with the numbers on around the Board so that they can be moved with ease.

Please note that there are several ways of solving this magical squares and only one way it appears on the page response.

Magic square negative numbers

Short Division of decimals (2)

Here is another page of practice on the use of the short method of Division of decimals. All unnecessary write numbers with the short method is avoided. The numbers are distributed are just units and tenths that helps with getting the method correctly.

One of the best ways to smooth with this method is to talk through out loud. Eventually this leads to talk by, ' in your head '.

If we look at question 1 divided by 3 7.2, the verbal stages:

a. how many 3s in 7?

b. 2 times 3 is 6 so there 2 with a remainder of 1.

c. Insert the 2 on the line response, directly above the 7.

(d). Insert the decimal answer just above the line, so that it can be clearly seen.

e. the rest 1 is placed just before the 2 (usually smaller written).

f. how many 3s in 12?

g. 3 x 4 is 12 so the answer is 4.

h. place the 4 on the line response, directly above the 2 (tithes).

i. reply 2.4

This page can be found in our four lines, Division category.

Division of decimals (2)

$ 6.5 million for entropic gravity

One of this year the Spinoza prize goes to Erik Verlinde. It comes with 2.5 million euros to the winner of research fund. Last autumn Verlinde received a 2 million euro ERC Advanced Grant for the funding of its research programme, so that's a total of 4.5 million euros, or about $ 6.5 million this past year.

Verlinde's current research focuses on the ideas about "emergent gravity" (see here and here). According to Wikipedia explains his work the observed value of the cosmological constant.

I have no idea how Verlinde will spend the money, but it seems that emerging Ernst research particularly well will be financed. 6.5 million dollars that I would estimate corresponds to approximately 100 post-doctoral years. In a few weeks will Verlinde reveal his latest work on strings 2011. Because that is one of the most expensive conferences around (see here), maybe he could chip in to fund. He must be able to finance one strings 20XX via at least 2,050 I would estimate.

Know Division facts: year 5 maths worksheet

There is no doubt that most children find Division harder than multiplication, but there is little real reason for this to be so. Most Division questions can be turned on their head be made to look like multiplication. For Example:

30 ÷ 5 =??  can be considered as 5 times what number makes 30?

?? ÷ 6 = 7 can be considered as 6 times 7.

60 ÷?? = 10 can be considered as 10 60 times what number makes?

The key to success with Division is a really good knowledge of times tables.

This worksheet looks on this species Division question, all with simple numbers and no waste and is a good assessment sheet to see if Division is understood and tables known.

This can be found in our category year 5 know number facts.

Know Division facts (1)

How the Hippies stored physics

An outline that I wrote of how David Kaiser of the Hippies stored physics is now available from the American scientist. A short summary is that I think it's a wonderful book, tell in well researched and entertaining a story that I've always wanted to know more about fashion. I am not convinced by the main argument of the title, that this group of people "Physics saved", rescuing a suffocating ideology "shut up and calculate" by the road to the importance of the theorem of Bell's tones and help start the field of quantum information theory. Maybe emulates the author just his subjects, known for their playful outlandishness.

There are quite a few interesting things I learned from the book that didn't make it in the review. An example is the story of the (of EST fame) Werner Erhard theoretical physics conferences in the late 1970s and early 1980s, organised in collaboration with Sydney Coleman and Roman Jackiw. One of the factors that these events put an end to was the advent of string theory: it was felt that no string theory Conference without attending the whites would be taken seriously, and then nothing wanted to Whiten with EST and its founder (although he had attended, with the likes of Feynman and Weinberg, the earliest Conference in the series back in 1977).

If you do find interesting this topic, I highly recommend the book.

For a different take on the same subject, one of the main participants, is Jack Sarfatti memoirs Stargate free available these days in a pre-publication version here.

I'm afraid that my own description of where the physicists described in the Kaiser would not book ended the field of quantum information theory, but the much larger quagmire of dubious claims about quantum physics which is still very influential. For example, this week at the AAAS meeting in San Diego there is a session on Quantum Retrocausation is, see this listing from the world of parapsychology.

Update: I must also mention that Chad Orzel the book discusses here and here.

Singapore Math the answer? Look again ... ...

More than 2000 schools throughout the US have adopted the Singapore math method. Singapore is doing well with its methods, then again, Singapore is Singapore. And, although Singapore on the 2nd in fourth grade math and, researchers tend to support their strategies, working in the same way here? Perhaps not. Unfortunately, when tried, the scores have dipped lower than normal. In fact, the scores were very disappointing. One would think that a heavy focus on the ' back to basics ' approach to transitional period type students. If not Singapore, what works? In my opinion-balance! And I will stop there. However, it's worth checking out the challenges that faced a school while trying of Singapore.

6 times table space challenge

Children need so many opportunities as possible to practice their knowledge of tables and teachers are always looking for something else to maintain interest. Hopefully this page will be useful, since there is a bright and fun way to show how well the 6 times table is known and it can also be used as a timed challenge.

Beginning at the start moving to the first box, and write the number 6 time shown on the left side, then on to the next box, and so on. There are 20 questions at all; Some children can be ' stuck ' on a question, encourage them to go and then return to the end. If they are stuck remind them, for example, that if they forget 6 x 6 is the only six more than 5 x 6 which they must be able to remember.

This page can be found in our section math worksheets, multiplication four lines, and hopefully I will be adding similar pages for other tables times did not last long.

6 x tables space challenge

Quick Links

"I felt that he had destroyed my life," says Morris. It left him for the next few years reeling: he remembers in a coffee shop in Berkeley with Daniel Friedan, a fellow Princeton exile and the son of the feminist icon Betty and commiserating about the frustrating time they had from East.

"I'm talking about all these problems I had with Kuhn, which is a constant refrain was, and he tells me about all the problems he had in the Department of applied physics," recalls Morris. "He said, you know, ' she just could not appreciate me. I had discovered a new kind of Physics! " And I thought, ' Oh, no. This looks bad. This looks very, very, very bad. This is not going to turn out good. We go both to the nuthouse. " ”

Of course, they're not. Friedan would go on to win a Macarthur Fellowship, and be recognized for his pioneering work on string theory. Morris, meanwhile, left academia once and for all to make a movie about a pet cemetery, called "Gates of heaven," which became a cult classic, and Roger Ebert described as one of the 10 greatest films ever made.