Sonja's Sept. 22 post

I've linked Sonja's post here because it's 3 MB file, and blogger seems to have trouble with .wps cutting and pasting. Check out her efforts, and leave her some comments for her work.
RM

Sept 25 Lindsay...

Today is Monday, September 25th. I have already done this once, but hey it didn't wanna go through. I was disappointed to walk into class to learn that Mr.Maks wasn't there, but I'm hoping to see pictures of his brand new baby boy when he returns. Mrs.Gust started out by taking attendance and handing out progress reports for the people who scanned their accelerared math. Unfortunately I am not one of those people, but I'm jumping on that. The class then began studying with a little bit of chit chat inbetween. We have the opportunity of taking in a "cheat sheet" for tomorrow's TEST TEST TEST.. so if you haven't started that I suggest you do that for tomorrow the 26th (as we had all class to do so). I find the hardest topic to understand is Transition Matrices because you have to create a picture to understand the question. I plan on checking out Tori's blog again for the explanation of it so I can study it more for my test. If you also find this to be a difficult topic I suggest you check it outt!!!!!! So get er done tomorrow. peace,Lindsaay

Sept.21 Amy

Date: Thu, 21 Sep 2006 15:06:09 -0500 (CDT)>Hello Mr. Max! This is my blog, not really sure what to put on it but here>goes!>>Hi Classmates, so I’m the blogger for our class on September 21, 2006.>Today Mr. Max came and told us the news about his new baby boy! Congrats>on that! We also gave him our scan cards on what we have done so far in>accelerated math for him to scan. Classmates coming from first hand>experience DO NOT GET BEHIND IN AM. It is very hard to make a comeback>after doing no work like all semester and struggling at the end. We were>reminded that our test has been changed to Tuesday. Also a little note to>remember, we are allowed to bring in a “formula sheet” that has anything>you want on it. Exercise 7 & 8 were checked today and we started to go>over but ran out of time because the sweet new computers decided that they>don’t want to work anymore. All I have to say about that is Technology is>sweet…….This is pretty much our class today and I have no idea what else>to put on here so that’s all for now folks!>>Oh yeah the person I choose to do this is……Sonja!>

Sept. 20 Melissa

Hey Mr.Max this is my blog for today
Its Baby Day!!!!!!!
Melissa B
Hello My fellow students this is my blog thingy for today. It is Wednesday the 20th and today Mr. Max's wife had her child!!! CONGRATULATIONS Mr. Max we all cant wait to see pictures of your beautiful new baby.
Well today was pretty much a day to just relax and chill out and do whatever you wanted since Mr. Max wasnt here! haha just kidding.... Today we continued on the math problems that were due today, there was alot of them and i am pretty sure that everybody includin me were done them. It was also a time to catch up on our excelerated math. It really sucks gettin behind on that stuff cause there is like no way to catch up after. Its so hard believe me i would no... I did it last year and I sugest that nobody do it this year.
Hey one thing thats really awesome our TEST is moved to next Tuesday how awesome is that. So now everybody can get an awesome mark because we have more time to study!! Isn't that just awesome haha.
So anyways that was our math class today like i said it was pretty interesting and alot of stuff got done today as always... so take it easy Mr. Max with your new baby, keep smiling and we will see you when u get back.
O and the next scriber person thingy will be Amy!

Kristan on Tuesday

Well Mr. Maks, heres my blog! I have no clue what exactly I'm doing, but hey, I tried!

Its Kristan, Tuesdays Blogger... blogee... whatever...

Today was a very very short day. We had about half an hour to do work because it was a day 2, and we had an assembly.

This is basically what we did...
1.) Well, we have a test on FRIDAY, so start preparing!
2.) Exercises 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 8 are all due WEDNESDAY
3.) Accelerated math, once finished all the above mentioned exercises
4.) Learned we have an Accelerated Math Test probably next Wednesday.

That is really all that we did today, and hopefully I wrote this all right for you guys!

~*Kristan*~

Courtney's Friday Post

Today is my turn to do the blog, I am kind of nervous to do it, because I’m still not quite sure what to write. I will try my best to tell what happen in today’s class, so all the students that miss this class will know what we did.

At the beginning of class we talked a little bit more about the blog, and how it is the person that did the blog the day before, is responsible to pick someone to do it the next day, no matter what (if they missed the next class after they did the blog). He also gave us another sheet to work on that continues from exercise 5, which mean, he gave us exercise 6. Mr. Max told us that we can pick any of the 3 questions to do out of the 6 questions from that page to do for Monday’s class. (You better do it because he will be checking if we did it)

We started off class with, of course, mental math. To tell you the truth, I really don’t like mental math, but Mr. Max said that at the end of the semester, you should be able to do mental math in your head fast.

In today’s mental math, he always gives us questions about which I find kind of hard, because I forget how to do those questions. He also threw in the question about, “Is matrix multiplication is a commutative” True or False. Of course I got that one wrong. I remember Mr. Max talking about that yesterday but for some reason I thought it was true. But yes, it was false.

So, after mental math, he let us work on our homework, which is exercise 5 for the rest of the class. So that sums up what we did in Fridays class. I hope I did an okay job at this, but for my next one, I should do better. The person that I’m going to pick for Monday’s class is Kendra.

Thanks, Courtney

Kendra's Monday Post

let's see if this works???

I've hotlinked the text above to Kendra's post, so I could preserve all of her formatting. I'm smarter than this, I'm sure, but my html abilities are sorely lacking, as you all know. hit the link, it's sure worth it. WOW WOW WOW.

RM

Tori's Transition Matrices

Transition Matrices
The idea of transition matrices is to use the matrices to accurately predict the "future" distribution of quantities. After some predetermined “switching” or “transitional” behavior is applied to some number of the things over a series of generations of “switching.”
In a transition situation it is imperative to create you “initial condition” matrix as a row matrix, with heading for columns matching the transition matrix.

The example Mr.M gave us had to deal with Vehicle Purchase Patterns. He made us draw out a “transitional diagram” that looks like Figure 1. Remember the “Loopie” always goes back to itself!



A. C T V
C 0.89 0.04 0.07 =1.0
T 0.02 0.95 0.03 =1.0
V 0.05 0.08 0.87 =1.0


Consider at the beginning of this situation, the known distribution of vehicle buyers, is as such:

Cars- 60000
Trucks- 80000
Vans- 75000
*The number total in this example is STATIC value!

B. Now… C T V
60000 80000 75000

So, Now we actually have to do the math:
1 x 3 3x3
B A
Row Matrix’s = 1 x N
X
Transition Matrix’s = N x N
So in the future, the values in the “answer” Matrices will ALL stabilize to some value…
In this Case B x A ^100 , and then compare to B x A ^101, we can see that the values come together and equal
C T V
44975 118469 51556

Enjoy reading this blog it took forever, and always remember Matrix Multiplication is NOT Commutative!



Figure 1 below:

Scribe List

Since I'm struggling with html tags, and by my own admission, I must look like a moron for not being able to format a simple strikethrough, if a name appears small, bolded, and italicized, those people CANNOT be chosen as a daily scribe.

I'll update this daily.

In class, we've discussed some of the responsibilities for class 'scribes' or 'day bloggers' or whatever we're calling them. Big Kudos to those of you who've already been there/done that, but here's the much promised list. I'll change your name if you want me to, and remember to use first names only, since it's school-stuff. Cheers,

Mr. Max

Lindsey Christina Kendra Brett
Melissa Amy Shawn Krystal
Lindsay Melissa Amanda
Tori Sonja Chelsey
Courtney Matt Stephanie
Jeff Cody Seth
Kevin Anthony Brennan
Kristan Hans Curtis

Hans' Post (Is that apostrophe correct???)

Well so its my turn to blog today so Im gonna tell you what happed as basic as possible. First we looked at the assignment which was supposed to have been done. However I didn't finish it because I was at golf sectionals. In case your interested we got 2nd place, that means we go to Gilbert Plains this thursday.

Anyways, after we briefely reviewed the assignment he ( Mr. Max) asked us to ask him if we had any questions or "so forever hold your peace". So some people asked some questions and he answered them.

Once this was completed we went over what was considered allowed and not allowed on this blog. Then we waited about 2 minutes for the bell to ring then went for lunch I had a turkey sandwich and a fruit cup with cookies. That pretty much sums up our math class for today.



Thank You
Hans

Sept 12 Class

Stephanie says:

The lesson that we learnt on Tuesday was about Matrix Multiplication. To start off your must consider theses “rules of engagement” which means that the matrix multiplication can only happen under certain circumstances.

Example A: A= [ a b] [e f ]=B
[ c d] x [g h]
2x2

your end result would be: [ae+bg af+bh]
[cg+dg x cf+dh]

Tip: You can also use your hands to assist you in creating a new matrix. Make a “L” with your hands, and move then as you change columns to columns and rows to rows. The left hand only moves up and down, while your right hand only moves left to right. It works really well if you can’t remember what to multiply by what next.

Rule: If Amn (row x column) is to be multiplied by Bpq, then the “Inner Dimensions” must be equal, that is n=p and;; the size of the product matrix is given by the “Outer Dimensions” or in this case mxq (which tells how big it will be)

To simplify what I just said; the “Inner Dimensions” tell you if the multiplication will work or not and the “Outer Dimensions” tell you what the new dimensions will be.

So in the case of A45 * B59, the multiplication would work because the inner dimensions are the same therefore the new matrix dimensions will be 4 x 9.

This concludes the end of my blog, and the next blogger will be number 16.

Thanks Stephanie

Some musings on a Tuesday evening...

So, I'm sitting here in my classroom thinking about this whole 'connectedness' idea of what I intend for these blogs to eventually provide.

As carefully (but as sincerely) as I can, I'm going to try to repeat what I've been pushing in class, and with time, some dedication on all of our parts, and maybe a little luck, things should go well....

What I think a classroom blog SHOULD be....

1. A safe place on the web for us as class to share with each other, as we learn together. It's supposed to be a learning community.
2. A place that allows for the individuality of both the instructor and students, allows us to have a sense of humour, and above all, a place that allows us to improve the status quo from a more traditional classroom instruction model.
3. A place that focuses mainly on course material and the human interactions that go along with being responsible for learning that material...(after all, some people say that math is hard?!)

What I think a classroom blog SHOULDN'T be........

1. A place to rant or vent irresponsibly, especially since THIS IS ON THE INTERNET FOREVER!!! Maybe before you post your next class scribe effort, ask yourself some questions like "If my Mom/Dad/Grandma/person I care about /were to read this, they'd like my contribution and support future blog posts like this", or how about "What kind of person do I appear to be if this is what I'm putting out there for the world to read today".....I'm not saying that I'm in favour of editing or censorship, but this is a classroom, this is a school, I am your teacher, and you are my students. Period.
2. A place to gain/maintain social status at the expense of anyone, anywhere. If it isn't positive, why post it? What good will it do? At risk of sounding like my father (who is a great guy, by the way), something like the Rotarian 4-way Test could apply here. I challenge you reading this to go out and google it, and then reply to this post with the 4-way test. (If you want to cheat, hit this link)
3. A terribly personal place where we all go to share our innermost feelings (uggg..). I'm not likely to discuss the details of my soon-to-be-born second child's delivery, nor my plans for Christmas vacation on my school/classroom blog. It just isn't the place for such things.....The older I get, the more I wonder if the saying "There's a time and place for everything" makes sense, but I guess the point is that if it doesn't have much to do with math, or what's going in my classroom, it really doesn't belong on these blogs....

Enough for now...and I'm going to post this on all three of my ongoing blogs (URL's on this page)....As always, reply thoughtfully, honestly, and often....

later,

R.

September 11 scribe is...

Curtis....

I was just thinking, Curtis, that since you're new to our school, maybe this would be an appropriate venue for a tiny bit of a bio...your call, whatever you think....

later...

Curtis says....

Well to day was what i would call slack.. but i guess we did get some suff done. At the start of class we did the wonderful mental math that i know everyone loves so dearly. After that was all rapped up we went to check out Seth's blog.. i'd have to say that he did a pretty good job and Mr. maksymchuck was overwellmed with pride that his student was capable of such a feet.. lol. Anyways after checking that out and we moved on to discusing the good things that Seth did in his blog and the things that we will look to improve witch i'm not really doing. After that was all done we got our fancy new computers that are amazing... then sadly the class was over and lunch began.. Curtis

O wel i just got Mr. Mak's message that i should talk a bit about my self.. well i'm no that exciting but i could share a few things with you. I'm form Boissevain MB it's a crap holoe town that even more boring than Swan.. and don't take that personally it's just what people tell me.. I guess the reason that i'm here is cause i'm playing with stamps for the coming up hockey season. Should be a good time! there isn't alot about me that you probily want to know so i'm just going to leave it at that.. Curtis

Sept 08/06 Class (Hooray for Seth!!!)

Seth says:

First Post!

Hey everyone....if you're reading this, you must have navigated correctly...good news.

Sometime fire me off an email with your screen name, so we can begin this process of keeping track of what we do....

Mr. M.