Yeah, get Ken back in here. He has an uncommon clarity of thought which
is sorely missed.
And the hippo squaw thing is easier when you read the whole joke.
------ Original Message ------
From: "Steve Jones" <[email protected]>
To: "[email protected]" <[email protected]>
Sent: 12/12/2017 12:00:37 PM
Subject: Re: [AFMUG] OT Fun - probably non PC - possibly racist
i dont understand it
but im offended
not that its racist or anything, just that ken wont come back even
though its lent
tell him if he will bring his ball back i will be good
On Tue, Dec 12, 2017 at 10:58 AM, Cameron Crum <[email protected]>
wrote:
I teach my kids with this method and use it quite frequently in
designing odd shaped speaker volumes. Was just doing that last night
in fact! I love the play on words.
On Tue, Dec 12, 2017 at 10:14 AM, <[email protected]> wrote:
Below is a part of a thread between me and Ken Hohhof. I found it
fun last night.
Can you figure out the riddle?
From:[email protected]
Sent: Tuesday, December 12, 2017 9:08 AM
To:Ken Hohhof
Subject: Re: OFFLIST: government is not the only place where money
talks
I called 4 of my kids and asked them if they could understand the
squaw on the hippo.
First kid, my youngest son, 23 years old, really good machinist,
acted like I was speaking a foreign language. Even with hints and
prompting he never got there.
Second kid, actually works for a company building parts for Space X.
CS degree. He took lots of hints and prompting.
Third kid, EE, works for DOD at Hill Airforce Base got it instantly.
I was surprised as his EE coursework seemed about 1/3rd as rigorous
as the stuff I had to do.
Fourth kid, science teacher in Jr High, got it with a minor hint.
Her husband, ME student at the Uof U didn’t have a clue.
3 more kids to ask. That was fun!
From:Ken Hohhof
Sent: Monday, December 11, 2017 5:07 PM
To:'Chuck McCown'
Subject: RE: OFFLIST: government is not the only place where money
talks
Well, that’s discouraging. The books might be digital now, but
nothing else has changed in almost 50 years.
BTW, the “new math” happened while I was in approximately grades
8-10. We had paperback textbooks from SMSG (School Mathematics Study
Group). I don’t remember them as being bad. I think a lot depended
on the teachers, whether they knew the material and taught it well in
the classroom including the practical applications that Feynman wrote
about. Teachers were more highly valued in that period than now, and
I think I had some really good science and math teachers especially
in high school. The “new math” approach I think was the first
attempt at teaching college type math to all high school students
rather than assuming most students would never need algebra, trig, or
Venn diagrams.
When my kids went to high school, everything in math class seemed to
center around graphing calculators. I’m not sure why. It doesn’t
teach fundamentals, and hardly anyone solves daily math problems with
a graphing calculator. I think it’s the same approach as teaching
the way to find the diagonal of a right triangle is to cut one out of
paper and measure it. I remember a bad joke in high school that
ended with “the squaw on the hippopotamus is equal to the sons of the
squaws on the other two hides”. Who today would even know what that
refers to?
From: Chuck McCown [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Monday, December 11, 2017 5:16 PM
To: Ken Hohhof <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: OFFLIST: government is not the only place where money
talks
Richard Feynman had an interesting experience with the textbook
selection process:
http://www.textbookleague.org/103feyn.htm
<http://www.textbookleague.org/103feyn.htm>
From: Ken Hohhof
Sent: Monday, December 11, 2017 4:01 PM
To: 'Chuck McCown'
Subject: OFFLIST: government is not the only place where money talks
Pharmaceutical companies of course spend a lot of time and money
recruiting doctors to prescribe their drugs and recommend them at
medical conferences.
Same thing is happening with classroom technology like laptops and
software, raising ethical concerns. Lots of articles like this:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/02/technology/silicon-valley-teachers-tech.html
<https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/02/technology/silicon-valley-teachers-tech.html>
And apparently there was a scandal at Baltimore County Schools
concerning a big contract for HP laptops:
http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/DigitalEducation/2017/11/baltimore_county_tech_conflicts.html
<http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/DigitalEducation/2017/11/baltimore_county_tech_conflicts.html>
My guess is shenanigans like this go on to a greater or lesser extent
in almost any school district and influences the contracts for “Ed
Tech”. So we end up with kindergartners having iPads and
Chromebooks, all the textbooks being online, and teachers using
classroom management software, and wondering how much this really
improves education. Maybe it’s all great stuff, but it seems to show
that lobbying and buying influence are not restricted to Washington.
Silicon Valley goes after the educators the same way Big Pharma goes
after the doctors.
