Monday 
July 16th, 2007
Today, for our first day at Camp, I learned a ton of cool things. We first talked about women mathematicians since must people only know males like Albert Einstein and Sir Isaac Newton. I learned about Emilie du Chatelet who lived in the 1700's. She married a man that allowed her to learn math which was a disgrace in her time period. Against everyone's backs she taught and helped students study from Harvard University. This, I thought was cool because she defied everyone to do math! I also learned a lot of things that I didn't know that you could do on a calculator. With the calculator, we discovered different ways of doing probability. With this new knowledge, I had to estimate the perimeter of a triangle flag. I was so close because I guessed 175cm and the correct answer was 182cm! Our instructor gave myself and others, foam shapes to work with Tessellations and also for a visual aid. To get to know the other girls better, we made Venn Diagrams of what we have in common. After that we discovered where else we could use Venn Diagrams like in what subjects and things in life etc. We also had a speaker today who talked about polynomiography. His name is Dr. Iraj Kalantari. I believe that he and his brother made up a site which shows how to make polynomiography. Polynomiograpy is where you use math to make art which is totally awesome! Made lots of new friends and I did very well with bowling tonight too. Time for Bed!
TuesdayJuly 17th, 2007
Today was just as cool as yesterday except for the wake-up time. For estimation, which we do every morning, we had to estimate the area of a poster in sq. inches. I was the closest so I won the poster. I love the quote that's on it too besides the picture. For math, we learned about Fibonacci and the Golden Ratio. The golden ratio or Phi, is the number .6180...... since 233/377=.6180....So if you have a rectangle, and do the shorter side/ the longer side. If the rectangle is close or equal to .6180...., then the rectangle is called a golden rectangle. Fibonacci's sequence are 1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34,66,89,144,233,377.... You can use this for word problems like the rabbit's family tree(See website). We also learned about Pascal's Triangle which is similar to Fibonacci's numbers, but in a triangle. (See link for example). One problem that we had to solve was: If there are 6 people, and each person only shakes each others hand once, how many handshakes take place. See if you can figure out the answer while using Pascal's Triangle. Later in the day, we used 3-D shapes and Polyhedrons to make all kind of shapes so we could count faces, edges, and vertices. I also finished my craft today which was a decorated box that we can put whatever we want in it. It is so pretty. Swimming and Board Game Night tonight! Yeah! Then......Lights out!
WednesdayJuly 18th, 2007
Today we got up just as early which is the only thing that really stinks about camp. We explored Fractal Geometry which is something that is similar with itself but a different size like tree branches and broccoli. Then we moved on to Probability and Statistics and one of our word problems involved 5 kittens that would be born in 1 litter, and how many possibilities for females that would show up in the 1 litter. Then after we found out the answers theoetically, we did it experimentally. Two or Three females were the 2 with the highest probability. Next, was Codes and Ciphers which was really awesome! We learned all kinds of codes and I learned some really cool yet confusing wasys to send messages. My teachers at school better watch out because they won't be able to decode the notes in class to read them out loud once I teach everyone at school! After lunch we built Tetrahedral Kites which was awesome becasue on Tuesday, We had built all kind of shapes and many tetrahedrals so now we could make it into something that we could actually use. We also went swimming again tonight! FUN!
ThursdayJuly 19th, 2007
Today, we started out with Estimation and Critical Thinking which is always fun. Then we moved on to Pattern Recognition and Master Mind. I already knew how to play Mastermind so I was really fast and good at it. Not to brag or anything! Then we worked more on Pascal's Triangle with the '12 Days of Christmas' song. We figured out how many TOTAL presents recieved throughout the whole 12 days. Then we made a really cool origami! It's awesome(directions on link). After lunch we explored Polynomiography again, and we each had to design some, and then we all voted and.......I WON!!!!!!!!!!! People liked my polynomiographies the best! Scroll down to see them! Math camp has been fun, but the week is at the end. I hope you liked my website. My friends, you know who you are, keep in touch.
