Friday, March 14, 2008

pi day

Pi Day

As mentioned earlier, today was Pi Day! Seth and I went over to school to join in the celebration going on in some of the math classes. The students were told that they could bring anything to eat so long as it was round. There was SO much round food! And I have to say that the homemade brownies I made weren't bad! I couldn't try them earlier to see if they were good since it would be obvious if I had with it being round and all, but I tried one at the party and was pleasantly surprised.

Each class period was started off by a quiz about pi, just random questions. Then they shared the Bible verse 2 Chronicles 4:2 and discussed what the value of pi was in the Bible. The students figured it out. Way to go math teachers! They had a contest to see who could draw the most perfect circle by free hand and voted on the winner. They also got to play a circle game and eat as much round food as they wanted. There also was a contest to see who could memorize the most digits of pi. Two students pretty much tied at around 200!

(By the way, the "official" record for the most amount of pi digits memorized is about 42,000 digits. Someone else has claimed that they have memorized 150,000, but until he videotapes himself saying those and sends it into the Guiness Book of World Records, he doesn't hold the record. And who sits around and decides to memorize an infinite series of numbers that has no pattern?!)

Anyway, the winner of the pi digit contest got to choose a t-shirt. Kevin has had lots of fun looking through all of the pi t-shirts out there that you can buy. You wouldn't believe what kinds of nerdy math shirts you can get! But since two were so close, it was decided they both would win and get a shirt.

I go over to the high school a bunch, some weeks more than others. But as I spend more and more time with students, it's funny to see them interact. It's really easy to pick out those who are insecure and those who try so hard to always be the center of attention, or just try hard period. There's always that quiet group of girls and those obnoxious boys. Then there are those girls who are really loud and just flirt like crazy, who always act the most dumb.

It's also funny because since it is an international school, you get to see the differences in culture when it comes to behavior and their attitude towards school. It was mainly all international students who participated in the crazy pi digit memorization contest and the ones who did most of the other stuff. They were the ones when I watched Kevin's class earlier this week who actually took the extra time he gave them to do work. School is of utmost importance in so many cultures, and it shows in the way kids behave at school and how they work so hard at doing their school work. Now I know there needs to be a healthy balance because it can go to an extreme the other way, too, but I think many Americans don't care enough about education. It shows as our nation is behind so many others in this area.

(And I'm not even going to get on my soapbox about the need to memorize math facts!)

2 comments:

Stefanie Schocke said...

Cool shirt Uncle Kevin, where can I get one??!

Audrey said...

Oh what fun! March 14: Pi Day. If I were in my old classroom these days, we'd be noting the "ides of March" (March 15) from Shakespear'e Julius Ceasar. Isn't it marvelous that God has called us to things and gives us such joy in them? :) Talk to you soon!