Mashable: Extremely cool teacher runs math lesson from home within ‘Half Life: Alyx’. “Extremely cool teacher Charles Coomber —who works for California’s Springs Charter schools, at the Otay Ranch Academy for the Arts — taught a lesson in angle vocabulary from his apartment set within the long-awaited new virtual reality first-person shooter from developer Valve. Half Life: Alyx dropped on Monday, years after the iconic original game was released in 1998, and its sequel in 2006.”
mathematics
The Conversation: How to flatten the curve of coronavirus, a mathematician explains
The Conversation: How to flatten the curve of coronavirus, a mathematician explains. “This general concept of slowing the virus’s spread has been termed “flattening the curve” by epidemiologists – experts who study how often diseases occur in different populations, and why. The term has become widespread on social media as the public is encouraged to practise ‘social distancing’. But how does social distancing help to flatten the curve? We can explain by referring to what mathematicians call ‘exponential growth’.
Wolfram Blog: 15 Ways Wolfram|Alpha Can Help with Your Classes
Wolfram Blog: 15 Ways Wolfram|Alpha Can Help with Your Classes. “Thinking back on those late-night study sessions, I would have saved a lot of time if I had properly used Wolfram|Alpha as a study tool. Because I was a biology major, many of the areas in which I most frequently sought information were related to scientific fields such as chemistry, but Wolfram|Alpha can be a valuable resource in so many more areas. Here are 15 applications of Wolfram|Alpha in topics beyond mathematics. I hope you will find these to be useful both inside and outside the classroom!”
University of Sydney: How a first edition of Principia with Isaac Newton’s notes got to Sydney
New-to-me, from the University of Sydney: How a first edition of Principia with Isaac Newton’s notes got to Sydney. “While the original print run is estimated at between 250 and 400 copies, there are only 189 surviving first editions in the world and only four with annotations by the English mathematician himself. Of these four copies, the Sydney copy of Principia is the only one in the Southern Hemisphere and is held in the Rare Books & Special Collections at the University of Sydney library…. The University of Sydney copy of Principia has been digitised and is available online alongside other digital resources via the University’s digital collection.”
Lifehacker: How to Unlock Microsoft’s Free Graphing Calculator in Windows 10
Lifehacker: How to Unlock Microsoft’s Free Graphing Calculator in Windows 10. “While your math teacher (or your kid’s math teacher) might not let them lug a laptop into their calculus class, I still think it’s awesome that Microsoft is finally giving the good ol’ Windows Calculator a boost of geekiness. If you thought ‘Scientific’ mode was fun, you haven’t seen anything yet—coming soon, to Windows 10, is a full-fledged graphing calculator.”
EurekAlert: Math that feels good
EurekAlert: Math that feels good. “Mathematics and science Braille textbooks are expensive and require an enormous effort to produce — until now. A team of researchers has developed a method for easily creating textbooks in Braille, with an initial focus on math textbooks.”
Worcester Polytechnic Institute: Helping to Make Math “Graspable,” WPI Researchers Guide Design of Algebra Tool for Students and Teachers
Worcester Polytechnic Institute: Helping to Make Math “Graspable,” WPI Researchers Guide Design of Algebra Tool for Students and Teachers. “Researchers at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) have received a $185,085 subcontract for the second phase of design development and testing of Graspable Math, a digital platform that helps students learn algebra…. Students have traditionally worked algebraic equations by making notations on paper, but Graspable Math puts algebra onto tablet and laptop screens. Students click on or swipe numbers and symbols to solve equations and get instantaneous feedback on their actions, while teachers can monitor their work.”
