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Critical At Any Age

Essays and activities to exercise your mind.

Put 100 Marbles in a Bucket

Topics: Probability, Science project

The coin flip is a basic example of probability that most people are familiar with. Heads or tails. Fifty-fifty. Even Steven. If you flip a fair coin many-many times, half the flips will come up heads.

What Teachers Study

Topics: Education, Elementary School, Learning, Memory

Most small children haven’t internalized ideas like “can’t carry a tune in a bucket,” so singing comes easily to them. Some children learn melodies more readily than sentences.

The First Inquiry Pack is IN!

Topics: Critical Thinking, Inquiry Pack

An Inquiry Pack is a collection of activities and ideas that invite you to think as a mathematician, an engineer and an artist. It’s not a pack of stuff. It’s a pack of ideas, suggestions and challenges.

Make It, Dress It

Topics: Clothes, Engineering

Many people think that the people who play with dolls and the people who use mathematics are two different kinds of people. If you think that way, think some more.

Connecting the Dots

Topics: Graph theory

If I tell someone that my favorite branch of math is graph theory, communication seldom occurs.


What is the Same?

Topics: Counting, Science project, Sorting, Triangles

What should you take into consideration when you say that two triangles are the same? Should color matter? What about size?

A Book for Your Birthday

Topics: Birthday, Number Theory

Imagine that you are writing a book called “Life Story So Far.”  This book is divided into chapters, and each chapter covers the same number of years.

Starting the Day

Topics: Education, Observation, Room 103, Teaching

“The day doesn’t really start with the discussion, does it?” I ask Ms. K. “Everyone starts their own day before the little bell rings.”

Taking Notes in Room 103

Topics: Education, Observation, Room 103

“I wish there was a way for me to just sit and watch what is going on,” Ms. K told me.  “It is so important to see it all. You have to learn everything you can about each one of them.”

Reading About Teaching

Topics: Education, Room 103, Teaching

During the time I was visiting Room 103, two books offered valuable insights that helped me interpret what I was observing:

The Biggest Problem

Topics: Education, Room 103

At the beginning of the school year, the most pressing problem the students face is how to navigate their classroom. 

Teaching to the Top

Topics: Discourse, Education, Elementary School, Room 103

“I teach to the top. I think it is very frustrating for them when you start in the middle and keep raising the bar.”

In Room 103

Topics: Assumptions, Education, Elementary School, Room 103

Each day, for the first hour of the day, for the first two months of the school year, I parked myself in a corner of this elementary school classroom and took notes.

Story Problem

Topics: Circles, Problem

Once upon a time there was a little old lady who lived in a little old house in a little old wood, not too far from a field…

Hilbert’s Hotel

Topics: Infinity

This is a famous story in math circles, said to have been invented in the 19th century by David Hilbert.

Learning by Writing?

Topics: Learning

Writing can help you learn new things faster and better. This has more to do with how your mind works than how writing works.

2 + 2 and Math

Topics: Mathematics

If you get to 2 + 2 in your thinking, you might also get to ideas like counting, long division, prime numbers, and Sudoku puzzles.

Turing Test

Topics: Computational thinking, Computer science, Machines, Turing machine, Turing test

The British mathematician and logician Alan Turing formulated an idea which has come to be known as the Turing Test:  If, in every “conversation,” the machine responds in the same way as a human would, we can say that the machine thinks.

Critical At Any Age

Topics: Critical Thinking, Education, Geometry, Learning

Throughout my career as an educator I have worked alongside students, teachers, scientists, artists, and engineers. Critical At Any Age is my unfolding effort to share what I have enjoyed learning in these collaborations.


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News and Events

Nancy blogs weekly for the Latah Recovery Community Center, sharing writing ideas that support self-awareness and self-esteem.


Looking for an art project that is secretly full of math? Or a math project that results in interesting art? Equilateral Triangle is an Inquiry Pack full of project ideas that will keep you thinking for a long time.


Writing classes and workshops

In-person Write-For-You workshops at the Latah Recovery Center have been suspended for a bit, but you can still do the writing prompts on your own. For more information, about the Write for You program, or if you are in recovery and interested in writing coaching, contact Nancy.


 

Let’s Talk About It

This is a program that supports reading and discussion in libraries throughout the state of Idaho.

Working with the Program Committee, I updated the theme The Humanity of Science and Technology.


 

2021-22 Let’s Talk About It Discussions

November 10 – Tuesdays with Morrie – Clearwater Memorial Library – Orofino

 

November 18 – A Home Below Hells Canyon – Boise Basin District Library – Idaho City

 

February 8 – The Girl Who Fell From the Sky – Grangeville Centennial Library – Grangeville

 

February 15 – Sweet Promised Land – Garden Valley District Library – Garden Valley

 

March 23 – Less – Coeur d’Alene Public Library – Coeur d’Alene


Nancy Casey's Books

All the Way to Second Street

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COPYRIGHT 2016 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. NANCY CASEY | MOSCOW, ID.