Think of Them as Burritos
Greetings from lunch duty, where the children practically take care of themselves,
"Inaya talked through a few more problems with me. Instead of correcting her, I listened with an interpretive lens." I'm very impressed by the teaching in the second half of this post! I'm quite sure I wouldn't have thought of the games Jenna suggests.
guessthecorrelation.com is surprisingly addicting.
I showed this mesmerizing video of oscillation with an ultraviolet light to my calculus students last week. Gotta get my hands on some phosophorescent paper.
Me, on elite education: "How Education Helps the Rich Stay Rich."
Readers of my book have sometimes asked if I have a collection of my own worked examples I can share. The answer has always been, "no," followed by "what sort of idiot would give that away from free?" But now we have an answer: this kind of idiot. I'll start posting examples on this site, starting with this one.
Django Gold is one of my favorite comedy writers, and "A List of My Priorities" is (django) gold.
"If an orchestra didn’t pay musicians in line with economy-wide norms, it would constantly lose talent as its musicians decided to become plumbers or accountants instead. So over time, the incomes of professional musicians have risen." From "Why Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car."
Reading: Isaac Babel's "Odessa Stories" and "Under my thumb: songs that hate women and the women that love them," which features some very interesting essays.
Listening to The Mountain Goats' "Jordan Lake Sessions," especially "Against Pollution." John Darnielle on that evolution: "Since Transcendental Youth, I've sort of been getting more and more in touch with jazz stuff. My father is a jazz pianist. Every time I see him, I get a little piano lesson. And I'm not a good pianist, but I've been getting better at writing and modulating and doing all kinds of stuff that's interesting to me that I can't do on guitar."
The Monad Tutorial Fallacy: "But now Joe goes and writes a monad tutorial called “Monads are Burritos,” under the well-intentioned but mistaken assumption that if other people read his magical insight, learning about monads will be a snap for them. “Monads are easy,” Joe writes. “Think of them as burritos.”"
A few other links. Futility Closet on Norman Rockwell's creative methods. "Joel Coen"'s review of his brother's solo film. McMinn County's meeting where they explain why they are removing Maus from the curriculum. Old Ben Orlin calculus-adjacent post, "Powers Great and Small." An interesting number pattern.
Lunch is over. Bye!
Michael