Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 16/07/2026I am struggling to find a good one for b. 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 15/05/2026I notice that if I want to make 11 into the next whole 10 (20) I add 9 and if I want to make 8 into 10 I add 2. This is the kind of thing I do when it says to subtract so the answer is 9 in the tens place and 2 in the ones. My guess is this student has seen a lot of questions like 200-118. 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 06/03/2026#iteachmath Does anyone use a voice operated calculator? When marking I sometimes would like to check a calculation without picking up my calculator. I tried chatGPT but within the first 10 minutes it gave a wrong answer. 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 25/08/2025What do you notice? What do you wonder? #iTeachMath 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 29/07/2025Public libraries are just amazing! My daughter is doing a D&D campaign as part of the summer reading program and while I am waiting, someone got a document scanned, then an elderly person got help with their fit-bit, a bunch of books were signed out, and it is all just so damn pleasant. 041
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 23/07/2025I really like your line that "Some technologies are both very impressive *and* not useful." 120
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 18/06/2025I had fun with this, and love the clear and conceptual answer given. I took a bit more of a symbolic approach... 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 05/05/2025Idea for fraction practice, grab a set of sockets for a socket wrench and get students to order them largest to smallest. This may or may not have been inspired by dropping a toolbox on the floor. #iteachmath 030
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 27/04/2025Followup, it is not actually doubling each time. The first time I was able to stretch the clip from 5 seconds to 8.35 seconds. If this ratio continues how many times? 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 27/04/2025Real life math: I am adding a title to an audio file to make a video for youtube. The video editing software lets me stretch the length of the title clip to double its current length (more or less). The clip is initially 5 seconds long, how many times do I need to do this to make it an hour long? 100
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 30/01/2025Watching Wheel of Fortune and people always buy vowels at the first opportunity, but surely that is more likely to help your opponents? I would think you should wait until you think you will be able to solve. 010
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 11/01/2025#iTeachMath Used the WHO baby growth charts when teaching percentiles and quartiles. Solid stuff. 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 03/01/2025I have (maybe still kinda do, I dunno) felt the same! I wonder if this is a function of the calculators we had at the time. I wonder if this idea is maybe less common among kids today who have calculators that default to fractional answers. 010
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 20/12/2024It's my go to end of class filler. One version I tried a while ago was the second lowest number game. Where your goal is to have the second lowest non cancelled number. It ends up creating a bit of a paradox in that no one should write 1, but if no one would write 1, no one should write 2 and ... 010
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 20/12/2024One that takes a bit of prep is margin of error trivia, find 10 hard trivia questions with numeric answers. Students then answer the questions with a range of values they feel is a 90% confidence interval to contain the answer. So it is a question of how well you know what you know. 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 20/12/2024One students were playing today, wavelength. A student chooses a rating from 1 to 10 in their head. Other kids give them categories like "cars" and the student gives an example of a car at their rating. Then after a few categories students try and guess the rating. 100
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 20/12/2024For whole class, the greatest game, all students get blank paper write a phrase, then pass the paper, next person draws a picture of the phrase, that person folds over the original prase so only the picture is visible and passes it, next writes what the picture is and this continues for a few rounds 100
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 20/12/2024For pairs, undercut, students count down and hold out 1 to 5 fingers, they score the points they hold out UNLESS one of the numbers is one less than the other, in that case the person with the lower number scores the sum of the points and the other player gets nothing. Need to win by 11 pts. 110
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 20/12/2024For 15 min or so with full class lowest number game, students write whole numbers on scraps of paper with the goal of writing the lowest number no one else has wrote, so one is the lowest possible number but if two people write 1 it is eliminated. 210
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 20/12/2024Games, either as a class or in small groups. 100
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 15/12/2024Shouldn't it be a very hard problem and only those who answer correctly are restricted? 100
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 15/12/2024Like when you forget to feed your parrot? 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 14/12/2024Music for airports gets decent play in my classes (though mostly the background music is Cage's 4'33") 010
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 12/12/2024On Thursday (today/ they did research and used an online calculator to find how much lye they need to add to the fats to make soap, which ties in nicely with the ratio idea from Wednesday. Then did the carbide cannon to really drill the idea of ratios (and have a bang). Tomorrow we make soap. 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 12/12/2024On Tuesday we did Iodine Clock on how concentration affects reaction rate and what ions are. On Wednesday we did an antacid titration, which really gets the idea of the ratio of reactants. 100
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 12/12/2024Okay, I think I muddled my way into an awesome sequence of chemistry experiments for science for citizens 11 (a general science course) On Monday we did PhET simulations on building atoms and building molecules then did burning gummy bear as demo. 120
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 12/12/2024I was pleasantly surprised that searching for the dangers of dihydrogen monoxide still brings up the appropriate horrors. 010
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 12/12/2024Oh weird it works for me, I think it may be an SSL thing. Try putting in just HTTP rather than HTTPS? 100
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 12/12/2024For the second year I got students in Workplace Math 11 to do a Robot Prior's awesome motion graph matching exercise. I was nervous both times because it is legit tough, and tough doesn't always go well, but both times have been an absolute hit. #iTeachMath science.robertprior.ca/physics-11/k...science.robertprior.caPhysics 11: Kinematics 110
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 11/12/2024I wonder what the images were. It sounds like a modern take on the classic where one person can see an image and needs to explain it to a peer to draw. I am not sure I see major advantages of using AI over that, more collaborative perhaps. I kinda like this format of sharing a lesson. 100
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 11/12/2024My mom says some days are like that. Even in Australia. 110
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 11/12/2024What major skills do you think should and/or will be dropped from a standard K-12 curriculum in the next 20 years? Equation solving maybe? I can't imagine what it would mean to be good at math without being able to do basic algebra but maybe it is possible. #iTeachMath 230
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 10/12/2024Overview and Analysis of School Mathematics, Grades K—12, 1976 020
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 09/12/2024Do you know what the SECOND most populous continent is? 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 08/12/2024This means 25/175 is filled by the 1 inch divider so we can conclude the room is 7 inches wide. #don'tWasteTimeWithReasonablessChecks 010
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 06/12/2024Yea that is what hit me the hardest, it literally cannot believe in the student, but yet says it does. Some kinda uncanny emotional valley. 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 06/12/2024What is the area of the middle i.e. the overlap of the 4 quarter circles? Told to me at a BCAMT conference several years ago. #iTeachMath #recreationalMath 030
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 01/12/2024Planning, much like a gas, will fill the available space. Marking first. 030
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 30/11/2024Made fruitcake from an old recipe that makes one large (8x8), one medium (6x6) and one small (4x4) cake. How would you turn this into a math problem? #mtbos #iteachmath 512
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 28/11/2024I got through high school math without understanding that solving by factoring was exploiting the zero product property. 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 28/11/2024Neat effect in the sky today, on either side of the sun there was a very bright yellow/red dot that kinda looked like part of a rainbow. I didn't get a great picture that included both sides. 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 26/11/2024I like teaching financial math with spreadsheets. #iTeachMath 020
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 26/11/2024One of the delights I have recently discovered on this app is test tube games. www.testtubegames.com/games.htmltesttubegames.comTestTubeGamesTons of science games and simulations. Relativity, Electromagnetism, Particle Physics, Evolution, Gravity, you name it, you can play it! 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 24/11/2024I liked "Luck, Logic and White Lies" lots of different math concepts. 110
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 23/11/2024I think my only issue with personality traits would be if they are inferred rather than statements of facts. I like "Sue consistently treats her classmates kindly." I don't like "Sue is kind." 000
Pat Nelson (he/him) @patnelsonbc.bsky.social · 23/11/2024Special Relativity is always a blast. So many counterintuitive ideas that are forced on you by accepting the speed of light is constant. I love the idea that if you accept A (which you have to based on experiment) then you have to accept B and C all the way to Z. 010
