Friday, November 30, 2018

preCalculus Honors 2018-2019: Starting Our Trigonometry Boot Camp (November)

preCalculus Honors 2018-2019:
Starting Our Trigonometry Boot Camp
(November)

Chapter06+Chapter07 SCREENCASTS
We spent a couple of weeks, ending in a test, on intro to Chapters 6&7. Chapter 6 was about SOHCAHTOA, basic trig graphs (sin(), cos(), tan()) and SinReg. Chapter 7 was about the Unit Circle, Proving Trig Identities and Solving Trig Equations. Then we started another 2 weeks on Chaters 6&7 ending in another test spending more time on Special Trig Graphs (csc(), sec(), tan()) and using Trig Identities! 

 We always say:
"Be one with your inner Ramanujan! He figured trig all by himself before the age of 13. He had no school, no teacher, no book! He didn't even have paper or pencil. All he had was dirt and a stick!" 
If he can figure out trig under such dire circumstances, so can you!

I call this our 8 Week Trig Boot Camp as we spend all of Quarter II on Trig. We spend the first 4 weeks on Chapters 6&7 as described above. Then we cover Chapter 8 (Law Of Sines, Law Of Cosines and Triangle Area)for 2 weeks before holiday break and we spend 2 more weeks on Chapter 9 (Vectors and CIS(theta)) after holiday break. Then we review for MidTerms!


XTRA CREDIT FILKS RUBRIC 
(1 video = up to 5 bonus points):
1) Use a recognizable tune.
2) Karaoke entire song changing up the words (about STEM).
3) You are Singing, Dancing or Playing an instrument.
4) You upload your video to YouTube and provide the url.
5) YouTube Description includes the lyrics.

XTRA CREDIT ARTICLES RUBRIC 
(up to 5 articles = 1 bonus point each):
1) Cover Sheet is a Summary of the article.
2) Full Page, 12 pt Font, Double Spaced, 1" Margins.
3) Article has to be STEM related
4) Article has to be a current event.
5) Copy of entire article is attached.

Well, that's all folks!
Teaching with Technology, 
AJG
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AP Calculus BC 2018-2019: Applications of Integration (November)

AP Calculus BC 2018-2019:
Applications of Integration
(November)

UNIT06 ScreenCasts

We studied Applications of Integration (UNIT06) This unit covered such topics as the Area Bounded By 2 Curves, Volumes of Revolution (Disk, Washer and Shell methods), Volumes With Known Cross-Sections, Arc Length and Surface Area. 

We're loving our class set of TI nSPire CX CAS Graphing Calculators from Donorschoose! 
RECOMMENDED AP CALCULUS BC REVIEW:
CRIB SHEET (not given during exam) 
REVIEW BARRONS BOOK (see me)
REVIEW BARRONS ONLINE 
REVIEW DELTAMATH AB CALC FLASH CARDS
REVIEW APCENTRAL (lastest BC FRQs)
REVIEW APCENTRAL (older AB FRQs)
REVIEW APCENTRAL (older BC FRQs)
REVIEW EDX MOOC01 
REVIEW EDX MOOC02 
REVIEW COURSERA MOOC03 
XTRA CREDIT FILKS RUBRIC 
(1 video = up to 5 bonus points):
1) Use a recognizable tune.
2) Karaoke entire song changing up the words (about STEM).
3) You are Singing, Dancing or Playing an instrument.
4) You upload your video to YouTube and provide the url.
5) YouTube Description includes the lyrics.

XTRA CREDIT ARTICLES RUBRIC 
(up to 5 articles = 1 bonus point each):
1) Cover Sheet is a Summary of the article.
2) Full Page, 12 pt Font, Double Spaced, 1" Margins.
3) Article has to be STEM related
4) Article has to be a current event.
5) Copy of entire article is attached.

Well, that's all folks!
Teaching with Technology, 
AJG
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AP CompSci A 2018-2019: Conditional Statements (November)

AP CompSci A 2018-2019:
Conditional Statements
(November)

LAB05 ScreenCasts

LAB05 was all about Conditional Statements: if, then and else! We also talked about boolean expressions and predicate methods. Boolean expressions evaluate to true or false. We use these expressions in the if clause to ask a question during execution of a program. Predicate methods are accessors which return a boolean result. Also, predicate methods can usually be written very elegantly without resorting to long winded if then else or else if clauses!

BTW, we're loving our new cs50.io, aka c9.io, ide from the Amazon Cloud (AWS)! Don't forget about the Processing IDE! We just started using OpenProcessing online as they've just added Processing.js which is more compatible with Processing's IDE. The default mode is P5.js (javascript) but we switch to Processing.js (java) and all is well! So, we're computing in the cloud even when we use Processing! IDK, is OpenProcessing is on AWS or the Google Compute Platform (GCP)?

RECOMMENDED AP COMPSCI REVIEW:

CRIB SHEET (given during exam)
REVIEW BARRONS BOOK (see me)
REVIEW BARRONS ONLINE 
REVIEW APCENTRAL (past FRQs)
REVIEW EDX REVIEW MOOC01 
REVIEW UDEMY REVIEW MOOC02 
REVIEW CODING_BAT 
REVIEW PRACTICE_IT 
REVIEW DELTAMATH 
AUDIT CS50
XTRA CREDIT FILKS RUBRIC 
(1 video = up to 5 bonus points):
1) Use a recognizable tune.
2) Karaoke entire song changing up the words (about STEM).
3) You are Singing, Dancing or Playing an instrument.
4) You upload your video to YouTube and provide the url.
5) YouTube Description includes the lyrics.

XTRA CREDIT ARTICLES RUBRIC 
(up to 5 articles = 1 bonus point each):
1) Cover Sheet is a Summary of the article.
2) Full Page, 12 pt Font, Double Spaced, 1" Margins.
3) Article has to be STEM related
4) Article has to be a current event.
5) Copy of entire article is attached.

Well, that's all folks!
Teaching with Technology, 

Beautiful Mind Soundscape:
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Thursday, November 15, 2018

CIS(theta), 2018-2019 November Meeting: DonorsChoose Funded!

CIS(theta), 2018-2019
November Meeting: DonorsChoose Funded!


NOVEMBER UPDATE: See below for our Raspberry PI project. We have been waiting for funding for some extra hardware from DonorsChoose and we just got it! Yeah! In the mean time we're playing with PelicanHPC and BCCD DVDs to see how openMPI works so we can set it up the same way on our new Linux Cluster.

SEPTEMBER READING: CH01.
OCTOBER READING: CH02.
NOVEMBER READING: CH03.

OUR PROJECT:
We've decided to make a Linux Cluster out of Raspberry Pi single board computers! Our school district has been kind enough to purchase 25 RPIs plus some USB and Ethernet cabling, so now we just need some power supplies, routers and SD cards. So here comes DonorsChoose to the rescue! We started a campaign to raise the money to purchase all the remaining equipment from Amazon!



What we want to do is to replace our Linux Lab of 25 quadcore PCs, where we used to do this project,with 25 networked RPI 3.0s. The Raspbian OS is a perfect match for our project! Raspbian is linux based just like our old lab which was based on Ubuntu Linux. Also, python is built-in so we can just add openSSH and openMPI to code with MPI4PY once again! With the NOOB SD card, we start with Linux and python preinstalled!


Once we get all the hardware networked and the firmware installed, we can install an openMPI software stack. Then we can generate Fractals, MandelZooms, POV-Rays and Blender Animations!


NEW SMARTBOARD SETUP
NOTE: MIC FOR SCREENCASTING!
NOTE: TI nSPIRE CX CAS EMULATOR!!
NEW DECOR IN THE REAR OF ROOM 429
NOTE: SLIDERULE!
NOTE: OLD LINUX SERVERS!!
NEW TAPESTRIES IN ROOM 429
NEW VIEW FROM LEFT REAR SIDE
NOTE: OLD UBUNTU DESKTOP!
NEW VIEW AS YOU WALK IN
NOTE: SIDERULE!

====================
Membership 
(alphabetic by first name):

CIS(theta) 2018-2019:
Gaius(12), GiovanniA(12), JulianP(12), TosinA(12)

CIS(theta) 2017-2018:
BrandonB(12), FabbyF(12), JoehanA(12), RusselK(12)

CIS(theta) 2016-2017: 
DanielD(12), JevanyI(12), JuliaL(12), MichaelS(12), YaminiN(12)

CIS(theta) 2015-2016: 
BenR(11), BrandonL(12), DavidZ(12), GabeT(12), HarrisonD(11), HunterS(12), JacksonC(11), SafirT(12), TimL(12)

CIS(theta) 2014-2015: 
BryceB(12), CheyenneC(12), CliffordD(12), DanielP(12), DavidZ(12), GabeT(11), KeyhanV(11), NoelS(12), SafirT(11)

CIS(theta) 2013-2014: 
BryanS(12), CheyenneC(11), DanielG(12), HarineeN(12), RichardH(12), RyanW(12), TatianaR(12), TylerK(12)

CIS(theta) 2012-2013: 
Kyle Seipp(12)

CIS(theta) 2011-2012: 
Graham Smith(12), George Abreu(12), Kenny Krug(12), LucasEager-Leavitt(12)

CIS(theta) 2010-2011: 
David Gonzalez(12), Herbert Kwok(12), Jay Wong(12), Josh Granoff(12), Ryan Hothan(12)

CIS(theta) 2009-2010: 
Arthur Dysart(12), Devin Bramble(12), Jeremy Agostino(12), Steve Beller(12)

CIS(theta) 2008-2009: 
Marc Aldorasi(12), Mitchel Wong(12)

CIS(theta) 2007-2008: 
Chris Rai(12), Frank Kotarski(12), Nathaniel Roman(12)

CIS(theta) 1988-2007: 
A. Jorge Garcia, Gabriel Garcia, James McLurkin, Joe Bernstein, ... too many to mention here!
====================

Well, that's all folks!
Happy Linux Clustering, 
AJG
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Thursday, November 1, 2018

What are you doing for Grace Hopper Day?

What are you doing for Grace Hopper Day?
Every year around Admiral Grace Murray Hopper's (12/9/1906) and Ada Lovelace's, aka Augusta Ada Byron Countess of Lovelace, (12/10/1815) birthdays, I conduct an in-school Field Trip for the Honors Math classes to my PC Classroom/Lab to talk about taking Computer Science Honors (CSH) or AP Computer Science (CSAP) next year. In recent years, this has coincided with The Hour Of Code and CSED Week sponsored by code.org promoting Computer Science education in grades K-12. 

This year code.org has lots of new tutorials for CS ED Week, aka The Hour Of Code. I think I'll do these with my own classes too. I'm trying to get teachers to sign up their students for my Field Trip on Wednesday 12/5/2018. Since I don't have a lot of Seniors this year, I'm also going to show some of these tutorials to my own classes on Monday 12/3/2018 as a trial run.

I could show the Disney Frozen tutorial. There's so many good tutorials to choose from. Maybe I'll show the Star Wars tutorial? Wait, Angry Birds looks fun too! Karel The Dog was fun last year! I could do a different tutorial each period! 

There's a new tutorial based on the TI nSpire CX CAS that I may use for my AP Calculus BC class. That link also has a tutorial for the TI-84! One problem with these tutorials is that they are teacher driven. So, the teacher needs to know about programming in general and TI-BASIC in particular. Most of the other code.org tutorials are student centered with videos to keep them on track. 

We use the nSpire every day in AP Calculus. We even code with TI-BASIC on the nSpire. We've written code for solving Quadratic Equations and for Newton's Method. We even wrote code for Riemann Sums and Euler's method! So, maybe I'll show this tutorial on MATHLAB or Octave instead! 

Last year the Processing tutorial worked very well. The only issue with the Processing tutorial is that it will most definitely take more than and hour. Daniel Siffman, put together a nice intro but he sure likes to talk! I may take a couple of days on this one! My Computer Science students have been using Processing alot this year, so I'll do SAGE with them.

This year we are doing much the same thing. Our goal here is twofold. (1) Promote Computer Science Education in general. (2) Recruit more students for the CSH and CSAP classes next year!

For students who have not done The Hour of Code with me, codehs.com's Karel the Dog is an easier intro. Codehs.com has two new tutorials. Another nice tutorial is based on SQL and Harry Potter which is a little dry. Another tutorial is about making graphics with JavaScript which is a little challenging. I also like the code.org tutorials because they feature experts in the video tutorials such as Bill Gates and Mark Zukerburg teaching about if/then/else branches and repeat/until loops! 

Here's some videos from code.org:
Admiral Grace Murray Hopper is one of my personal idols! Not only did she usher in the entire industry of Software Engineering but she single handedly invented Computer Programming Languages! She was a Math Professor, a Naval Officer, the developer of COBOL and an all around class act! 
To honor Grace Hopper's memory, I registered all my classes for an Hour Of Code. Maybe you'd like to participate as well? The Hour Of Code is about exposing as many students as possible to Computer Science in all disciplines. I'm making this presentation during course selection week as well to encourage students to take Computer Science at my High School! 

 CSEDWEEK was an unprecedented international effort last year. Over 15,000,000 students at more than 30,000 locations (mostly schools) in nearly 200 countries were registered to participate and wrote more than 500,000,000 lines of code!
I teach Computer Science and see it as a great tool in all disciplines. It's a shame that more students don't take Computer Science in High School. Taking Computer Science can lead to a great major in college and a great profession! I also use Computer Science in all my Math and Science courses in High School and College! 
I've been teaching people how to code since 1975. I've also been teaching AP Computer Science at the High School level since 1984. Finally, I've been teaching computing at the College level since 1993. Needless to say, I'm a vehement advocate for a strong Computer Science Education in particular and a challenging STEM curriculum in general for every High School student. 

 In fact, every single class I teach, every single day of the week, is devoted to some aspect of STEM! STEM stands for "Science, Technology, Engineering and Math." Actually, I try to incorporate STEAM into my classroom: "Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math." By Arts I do mean Art (fractals, 3D graphics, animation) but I also try to tie in plenty of History, Literature and Culture. 

Mine is one of the few High Schools in the USA to offer a Computer Science curriculum! CS50 at Harvard, see playlist above, covers a lot of the same material we cover here at Baldwin Senior High in my AP Computer Science class. They use Scratch, C, php and JavaScript whereas we use Python, SAGE, MPI and Java, but the concepts are the same!

Sadly, the United States is falling far behind other countries in training professionals for jobs in the 21st Century that will require this skill more and more! So, in answer to this growing demand, here's what I teach (in addition to Math and Science):

Intro To Computer Science (python):


AP Computer Science A (java):

 
CIS: Computing Independent Study
(MPI with FORTRAN, C, C++ and python):


Calculus Research Lab (SAGE):
aka Scientific Computing Lab (Octave):
aka Computing Science Lab (R): 


Course Selection Week DropBox

Hope that was helpful!
Well, that's all folks!
A. Jorge Garcia

 
Applied Math, Physics & CompSci
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