May 19 2009 Me and My Work

Yesterday, prime factorization. Today, constructing numbers from combinations of prime numbers. See, the student has a problem understanding implicit relationships between numbers. We've tried all sorts of puzzle games, but he's always trying to make a prediction about the nature of the operations, and he always fails to come up with something logical. With this whole prime number thing, I'm really pushing him to make predictions about where the product of a selection of prime numbers will land. Furthermore, reducing such complex math to a game of sidewalk chalk puts me on his level literally, and brings his confidence up to my level. He never guesses, and he's rarely wrong.



My camera shyness reduces my self portraits to body parts. One of us is going to have to get over it. Also, I love these pants.