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Interesting co-incidence. Just last week, I sent out an email to my friends, saying that I want to teach mathematics to their kids by a math-by-email service, k

Interesting co-incidence. Just last week, I sent out an email to my friends, saying that I want to teach mathematics to their kids by a math-by-email service, kinda like the chess-by-email of the old days. The idea is quite simple: I will send out a daily email with a grade appropriate set of math questions and/or games. Your child provides the answers back by email. I check the answers, provide corrections/feedback. And the next day's worksheet is customized to the child's history. If there is an interest, I could follow the child all the way from pre-K to graduate level Math subjects. Think about that -- wouldn't it be awesome if when you are getting your PhD, you could look back over 20 years of daily problems you solved and how you progressed in your conceptual understanding? Naturally, you want to balance the gaming aspect with the rigorous aspects. You can start learning Graph Theory with diagram filling, but as you get more serious, there is no substitute to solving several hard problems to get a deeper/intuitive understanding of the concepts. There is no question that people learn different ways, some visually, others through games, and others through mental modeling. I am convinced that if we could tailor math teaching to each kid, we could get rid of the stigma that "Math is hard", or, worse, "Girls can't do Math". Math, as I say, is a contact sport, not a spectator sport. You have to grab a pencil and a piece of paper to work on 20-30-40 harder and harder problems to master each concept. But to learn new concepts, you also have to cross the significant hurdle of climbing the first few rungs of each concept, so to speak. So let's learn by balancing games and theory.

oldbuzzard 12y ago
or like math in the old days [1]. Israel Gelfand's stuff is model for enrichment at an upper level. Alexander Zvonkin's "Math from 3 to 7" book published by MSRI could be a model for younger kids. I think the "new math"materials for the '60s and '70s and the Eastern European materials from a similar period provide a model for education. Unfortunately, they require mathy folks to present and interpret the material. PS. I'm not criticizing public school teachers. I also feel inadequate. In order to teach DS7, I feel like I should probably work through Herstein's Abstract Algebra. I'll put it on the list... Currently I'm working through Euclid... Next Fall our homeschool will have a geometric focus... after that... who knows. [1] See http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html ... this was a pale imitation of what Soviet era math circles would offer but is still way beyond anything extant.
- lifeofanalysis 12y ago
  Your URL is broken -- has extra dots at the end.
  - oldbuzzard 12y ago
    Fixed
    - arm 12y ago
      EDIT 4: The solution: use a dash. 😤 ――――――――― EDIT 3: Okay, I give up. ――――――――― EDIT 2: Wow, okay, so my ZERO WIDTH SPACE was automatically escaped instead of treated as a separator. Anyway, I’m pretty sure the comment system accepts Markdown, so you should be able to use Markdown’s URL syntax to clearly mark which part is the URL without using a space to do the same: [1] See [http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html](http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html)… http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html](http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/... this was a pale imitation of what Soviet era math circles would offer but is still way beyond anything extant. ――――――――― EDIT 1: Scratch that! Looks like as long as there’s no space, it’s still considered a part of the URL regardless! Perhaps using U+200B ZERO WIDTH SPACE would still be considered a valid separator and could be used in place of U+0020 SPACE: [1] See http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html… http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html… this was a pale imitation of what Soviet era math circles would offer but is still way beyond anything extant. ――――――――― Just a tip—instead of adding a space after your three periods, you could have used U+2026 HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS instead, like so: [1] See http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html… http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html… this was a pale imitation of what Soviet era math circles would offer but is still way beyond anything extant. The HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS isn’t be interpreted as part of the URL since '…' isn’t a legal character to use in URLs (unless you write it in escaped format (UTF-8 encoding), which would be '%E2%80%A6').
      - ColinWright 12y ago
        > Anyway, I’m pretty sure the comment system > accepts Markdown, ... I suspect that's where you're wrong - I suspect the comment system is hand-rolled.
anifow 12y ago
I may be of assistance. Send me a PM
adidum 12y ago
I wish I was your friend, and on that email list. Your idea of "math by mail" sounds great, I am interested to be included on your list, please contact me if it is acceptable. Email in profile, thank you in advance!

oldbuzzard 12y ago

or like math in the old days [1]. Israel Gelfand's stuff is model for enrichment at an upper level. Alexander Zvonkin's "Math from 3 to 7" book published by MSRI could be a model for younger kids. I think the "new math"materials for the '60s and '70s and the Eastern European materials from a similar period provide a model for education. Unfortunately, they require mathy folks to present and interpret the material. PS. I'm not criticizing public school teachers. I also feel inadequate. In order to teach DS7, I feel like I should probably work through Herstein's Abstract Algebra. I'll put it on the list... Currently I'm working through Euclid... Next Fall our homeschool will have a geometric focus... after that... who knows. [1] See http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html ... this was a pale imitation of what Soviet era math circles would offer but is still way beyond anything extant.

lifeofanalysis 12y ago
Your URL is broken -- has extra dots at the end.
- oldbuzzard 12y ago
  Fixed
  - arm 12y ago
    EDIT 4: The solution: use a dash. 😤 ――――――――― EDIT 3: Okay, I give up. ――――――――― EDIT 2: Wow, okay, so my ZERO WIDTH SPACE was automatically escaped instead of treated as a separator. Anyway, I’m pretty sure the comment system accepts Markdown, so you should be able to use Markdown’s URL syntax to clearly mark which part is the URL without using a space to do the same: [1] See [http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html](http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html)… http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html](http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/... this was a pale imitation of what Soviet era math circles would offer but is still way beyond anything extant. ――――――――― EDIT 1: Scratch that! Looks like as long as there’s no space, it’s still considered a part of the URL regardless! Perhaps using U+200B ZERO WIDTH SPACE would still be considered a valid separator and could be used in place of U+0020 SPACE: [1] See http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html… http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html… this was a pale imitation of what Soviet era math circles would offer but is still way beyond anything extant. ――――――――― Just a tip—instead of adding a space after your three periods, you could have used U+2026 HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS instead, like so: [1] See http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html… http://gcpm.rutgers.edu/books.html… this was a pale imitation of what Soviet era math circles would offer but is still way beyond anything extant. The HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS isn’t be interpreted as part of the URL since '…' isn’t a legal character to use in URLs (unless you write it in escaped format (UTF-8 encoding), which would be '%E2%80%A6').
    - ColinWright 12y ago
      > Anyway, I’m pretty sure the comment system > accepts Markdown, ... I suspect that's where you're wrong - I suspect the comment system is hand-rolled.

anifow 12y ago

I may be of assistance. Send me a PM

adidum 12y ago

I wish I was your friend, and on that email list. Your idea of "math by mail" sounds great, I am interested to be included on your list, please contact me if it is acceptable. Email in profile, thank you in advance!