Pi Day Plans and Activities

Celebrate Pi Day!Pi Day is the biggest mathematical holiday that is celebrated in my middle school.  Years ago, I had students bring in pies and we did a few fun pi day activities in my own classroom.  Today, students at my school bring in pies and, along with the many pi day activities taking place in individual classrooms, over 1,000 students celebrate by eating pie at lunchtime.  PTA volunteers usually help to organize and distribute the pies.

Pi Day Plans, Activities, Videos, and More

The purpose of this post is to share with you some ideas that you might like to use in your classroom on Pi Day (March 14 – the date that corresponds to the first 3 digits of pi).  I will include links to two fun pi videos that I plan to share in my class, funny pi cartoons, and a link to the simple activity that I use to help students discover pi for themselves. [Read more…]

Math in the Movies

Oliver Knill, from the Department of Mathematics at Harvard University, has compiled a very interesting web page that includes video clips from 155 movies in which mathematics appears.  I enjoyed browsing this list and watching some of the clips of movies that I have seen in the past.  Many, but not all, of the movies can be watched using the full-screen options. 

Note: I believe that the video clips I have chosen to highlight below are classroom safe.  Some of the other clips on the website do include language inappropriate for the classroom.

Here are my favorite clips from movies that I am familiar with in this list: 

(Click the links below to watch each clip.)

Father of the Bride

In this hilarious clip George Banks (Steve Martin) is infuriated that hot dogs and hot dog buns are not sold in complementary packages at his local supermarket.  Dogs come in packages of 8 and buns in packages of 12.  I know that those of you with math minds out there have already calculated that George would have found contentment if he had just purchased 3 packs of hot dogs and 2 packages of buns.  Come to think of it, I think my textbook has an LCM problem like this in it! [Read more…]