by MathPickle | Sep 16, 2015 |
Unfair Thrones (MathPickle, 2013) This was MathPickle’s first puzzle to get into the New York Times. It is perfect to give students motivation to subtract fractions and turn the result into a percentage. Start the class by naming an empress and getting her to...
by MathPickle | Sep 16, 2015 |
Lazy Lemur Multiplication Let's start with an example. 01746 is good for lazy lemur multiplication because you can multiply it by a digit greater than one so that all five digits get shuffled, but remain the same. Students are lazy lemurs. As soon as they discover...
by MathPickle | Sep 16, 2015 |
Toothpick, Vampire and Domino Sequences (Clifford Pickover, 1994) Recreational mathematics is on the fringes of mathematics, but its real worth is in mathematical pedagogy. Vampire Numbers are a perfect example. They are ridiculous. Most mathematicians would not take...
by MathPickle | Sep 16, 2015 |
Mondrian Art Puzzles People who gaze upon a piece of Mondrian art should ask how he decided which colors to paint where. The disgruntled person may even ask what the piece of artwork might have looked like if Mondrian had taken the time to color it all in… In...
by MathPickle | Sep 15, 2015 |
Wreckerball & Recamán’s Sequence (Bernardo Recamán, 1995) What a delicious way to play on the number line! In these sequences you jump about by increasing intervals. The patterns that result are chaotic and beautiful. Nothing must be advanced in a positive...
