Published inILLUMINATION·5 hours agoMember-onlyHow to Start Liking YourselfSeveral years ago, I went through some rough times and spent some time depressed. I really didn’t like myself and thought about how much better off everyone I knew would be without me around. I recognized this as dangerous thinking and wanted to like myself but didn’t know how. Reading…Depression3 min readDepression3 min read
May 21Member-onlySimplifying RatiosRatios are handy for scaling things up or down. It’s best when we can see a clear relationship in the numbers, however, sometimes the numbers aren’t always the easiest to work with. In addition, students sometimes get confused about which two numbers you can simplify and which you can’t. I…Math3 min readMath3 min read
Apr 30Member-onlyMultiplying 2 Mixed NumbersMultiplying a fraction or a whole number times a mixed number is easy: You break the mixed number apart and multiply the fraction or whole number times each part. (I’ve talked about this in articles here and here) Multiplying 2 mixed numbers, however, has been problematical. Recently, I was working…Math2 min readMath2 min read
Apr 3Member-onlyAre We Teaching Math Wrong?I don’t have to repeat any statistics regarding America’s math scores; we all know they’re bad. I sometimes hang out on Quora and there are hundreds of questions essentially asking “Why do we need to learn math?”. They don’t see the point. I work teaching remedial math to army soldiers…Mathematics4 min readMathematics4 min read
Feb 13Member-onlySubtracting with Multiple Units: Borrowing at the EndWhen working with multiple units, be they inches and feet, pounds and ounces, or fractions and whole numbers, we have an option when subtracting that we don’t when we’re just using regular numbers: we can break the problem apart and borrow at the end (no loan application needed). The easiest…Arithmetic2 min readArithmetic2 min read
Feb 11Member-onlyMultiplying Large Mixed Numbers by FractionsThe standard method of multiplying a mixed number by a fraction is to convert the mixed number to an improper fraction, multiply straight across and then convert it back to a mixed number. …Math3 min readMath3 min read
Feb 11Member-onlyReuse/Recycle Your MathI’ve found a lot of my math hacks by being lazy. I don’t want to use any more effort than I have to to get an answer. One of the first things I started doing is to reuse or recycle the math I already did. One of the first things…Math4 min readMath4 min read
Published inILLUMINATION·Feb 5Member-onlyStill Another 10 things I’ve LearnedI know I said I was going to stop after the last list, but couldn’t resist writing about a few more. If you have allergies that make your eyes itch, rub them GENTLY. If you rub them too hard you can: give yourself a black eye. If you’re female, this…Life Lessons3 min readLife Lessons3 min read
Published inILLUMINATION·Jan 1Member-onlyYet Another 10 Things I’ve LearnedIt seems that I’ve learned a lot in life, but never really thought about it. Here’s yet another list. Hopefully, it’s my last list but I wouldn’t count on it. Please feel free to put things you’ve learned in the comments. The vast majority of people make decisions based on…Lists3 min readLists3 min read
Published inILLUMINATION·Dec 19, 2022Member-only10 More Random Things I’ve LearnedI wrote a story last week listing 10 random things I’ve learned over the course of my life, but that didn’t cover it all, so here’s some more. Most people (90% according to Briggs — Myers) make decisions based on feeling, so using logic to try to affect their thought…Life Lessons3 min readLife Lessons3 min read
