Thursday, October 18, 2012

oh so sweet... (typo)

For the love of numbers - D.R.Kaprekar (1)

Once upon a time (January 17, 1905 to be precise), there was born a boy named Kaprekar. He played with numbers like you and I would play solitaire in our pc. Maths was his entertainment. He went on to become a maths teacher and spread the joy and fun of playing with number to others. He was a maths teacher in the beautiful hill town called Devlali or Deolali (1929-1962). A number theory addict, he was invited in many colleges to talk about his unique methods.

He would say of himself:
A drunkard wants to go on drinking wine to remain in that pleasurable state. The same is the case with me in so far as numbers are concerned.
Well ofcourse, many Indian mathematicians laughed at his number theory ideas and called it trivial. After his retirement in 1962 he found it difficult to survive with his pension. He was forced to take maths and science tutions to make enough money.

International fame only came in 1975 when Martin Gardener wrote about Kaprekar and his numbers in his 'Mathematical Games' column in the March issue of Scientific American.

His discoveries in number theory include
Let us make him our hero by entertaining ourself with these fun methods...

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Can you imagine...the integers? (student)

If numbers are just numbers and operations (+, -, x, /) just symbols, oh... then maths is really boring.
Well, actually numbers can be imagined as values which make sense. HOW????

I was walking up the stairs with my lil chaaru behind. I had climbed 5 steps and she was still in the first step. Mummy come and hold my hand, lets walk up together. So i came down 4 steps.
Which step am I in? 1st step right.
This is how we should start learning integers, where down, below, back, wrong , etc generally denote the negative value of a number.
The above incident can be numerically written as 5+(-4)=1.

In a snake and ladder game I was in the 15th block. I gained 3 steps in the ladder and fell down by 7 steps. Where am I now. 15+3=18, 18-7=11. Here I have to come down by a total of 7 steps.

Draw the number line in a chart or a paper and stick it next to your bed. Try different jumping actions in the line till you understand the working of negative and positive numbers. 

Whenever you work on the integers, visualise the number line (?), imagine it in your mind. The figure should be stuck in your mind. Remember that zero lies between the positive and negative numbers. Well, Iam sure you know that zero has no value, positive or negative.



There you got it!!!

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