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#Post#: 148--------------------------------------------------
Rock and Sand Numbers
DIR By: StoryGod
Date: February 11, 2020, 9:16 am
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Enrichment math veered from set theory and symbolic logic to
number theory. Maybe it didn't veer if you were a math teacher,
thought Corianne, but she felt the return to numbers jarring.
"Now most of you have memorized your times tables," Mr. Vicente
told the room full of hungry fifth graders. These were the creme
of the Team Six fifth grader crop, which because this was Team
Six included kids who could program computers and build robots
or who had had fancy Japanese or Singaporean math which was
supposed to be the best math in the world, but while hands shot
up, the prime number seive and prime numbers in general were new
to nearly all the kids.
Corianne smiled with the slyness of a challenge that toppled
even the well-seated. Tikvah watched wide eyed. Prime numbers
were fairly simple. They were numbers divisible only by
themselves and one. Two was the only even prime. One and zero
were "special" numbers. One boy asked if prime numbers could be
negative. Corianne wasn't sure if any number could be negative.
She mused on that but then she remembered the thermometer with
the gold finches and cardinals on it back in Vermont. Sometimes
the mercury went below zero, so maybe negative numbers were for
very cold things unless you were measuring Celsius, in which
case the negative numbers were for only ordinarily cold things.
As the numbers grew larger, the prime numbers became fewer and
farther between. A prime number sieve was a square ten by ten or
thirteen by thirteen, and you filled it in with all the numbers
from zero to a hundred or a hundred and forty-four. Then you
crossed out all the even numbers except two. Finding numbers
divisible by three was easy. Their digits had to add up to a
number divisible by three. Numbers divisible by five ended in
five or zero and so on. When it was over, there were only a few
prime numbers left. Of course you could divide any number by any
other if you did not mind fractions, decimals, or a remainder so
in a way prime numbers were a fun fiction.
Corianne mused on this as she headed out of Oberto-Magrian and
over to Rapinoe-McConolly-Brinker for Advanced Aquatics. She had
a pair of sweats and a sweat shirt in her backpack as well as
her other pair of sneakers. Tomorrow she could wear sandals and
she could wear them Friday if the sneakers were still wet. She
could wear socks or not as she pleased. The Head of Aquatics had
told all kids to bring pants and a long sleeved shirt for
Wednesday's class. It was a big class before what for Tikvah
would be a supremely big holiday.
Corianne worried about Tikvah. Her calls to her dad that week
had sounded very ugly. Tikvah never called her mother. Corianne
did not call her mother either because she communicated with
both her parents via email. Her mother was eight time zones
ahead which made calling difficult. Her dad was mean. His new
wife made him mean. Corianne sighed. Tikvah looked remote and
sad.
"You thinking about Rosh HaShanna?" Corianne asked.
Tikvah shook her head, and Corianne left it at that.
#Post#: 152--------------------------------------------------
Re: Rock and Sand Numbers
DIR By: StoryGod
Date: February 18, 2020, 11:20 am
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Corianne knew that number theory in math would effect Team
Project because you cannot do word problems with prime numbers.
Corianne was half right. Team project Wednesday afternoon was a
combination of geography and math. The math for the least
advanced kids was still fractions, decimals, and times tables.
The math for the middle students was fraction and decimal word
problems or a choice of more geography, since most kids did not
know where any foreign countries were, and for the advanced kids
there was still a choice of word problems or geography.
Corianne, who thought grammar was baby stuff, and who liked
number theory too, enjoyed geography. There had been
international students at the school in Vermont, which was where
she and her mother lived in faculty housing, before mom got a
job in the Emirates and the school closed. "I can make more
money abroad, Cori," Corianne remembered her mother's words.
Corianne knew where the Emirates were, on the east coast of
Saudi Arabia that dangled like a....boot, from the Middle East
where Israel, Lebanon, and Syria all fronted the Mediterranean
Sea where octopuses lived in their octopus gardens.
Geography would give Corianne a chance to catch her breath
because she was still tired from swimming. It was hard work
treading water, blowing up your sweats, and lying on them like a
big, ill fitting raft. "Great job!" the Aquatics teacher had
cried. It was really pointless to be learning water safety when
noone would give you credit, but it was better than being last
for every stupid ball game in creation.
"Over here," Mr. Vicente called Corianne to his table. Tikvah
followed because she did not want to be alone. "Yes...."
Corianne said feeling nervous. "If you don't mind I'd rather do
geography."
"You don't need geography," Mr. Vicente answered. "Ms. Gottfried
says you ace it, but you probably can use more math."
"How does an adult know what I can use?" Corianne wondered.
Still she picked up a problem packet from the orange, plastic,
milk crate and a wad of scrap paper for writing and figuring.
Fifth graders in enrichment mathematics were too advanced for
work sheets. As the packet said: "show all work."
The packet looked like it contained word problems. Though word
problems were not a terrible fate, Corianne felt a twinge of
disappointment after number theory this morning.
Sitting at a seminar table across from Tikvah, Corianne read the
first word problem.
"You will need a prime number sieve to do all these problems,"
it said at the top of the sheet. Corianne kept reading. "Problem
1: Ilse is thinking of the smallest prime number that is one
larger than a number divisible by seven. What number is she
thinking of?"
"Well???" thought Corianne.
"I guess we just solve the first problem by counting along the
sieve."
"We need a ruler," Corianne answered. Adults could write all
sorts of math problems. There was probably no end of word
problems. For some reason, Corianne found that comforting.
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