3.14.16 is upon us… um, Rounded Pi Day?

/1 Comment/in , /by

We all now have our stories of where we were, who we were with, and what kind of pie we were chewing at the Big Moment last year: 3/14/15, 9:26:53.  Nothing will ever quite match the grandeur of that one.  Where was I?  I was in a room of 500 math majors and professors in Los Angeles, and we were listening to a delightful Pi-themed lecture (my talk came later that day).  The speaker wanted us to interrupt him as the moment was approaching, and I was keeping a close eye on the site Time.Is on my phone, which lit up each successive digit as they ticked into place.  I started the group chant, “10, 9, 8, 7, …”, and then it struck.  Boom.  An unforgettable moment indeed!

(Oh, and the evening before, things were already getting pretty festive in my world.  On my way to the airport, I happened to hear a clip of Pi Diddy’s rap played on NPR’s All Things Considered, and my “Pi Day of the Century” t-shirt led to a couple of folks taking what had to be the world’s math-geekiest “celebrity selfie” with me in the airport security line!  Kind of surreal.)

But that was SO 2015.  The year when anyone and everyone noticed and followed along.  Now we’re back to the core club of Pi Day fans.  You know who you are.  The ones who might get a bit excited that it’s Rounded Pi Day (3.14.16), but who don’t even need that kind of extra flair to get fired up about March 14.  So, let’s jump right in to Pi Day ’16.

What am I up to?  This year, Pi Day once again falls on a school day, and I’ll be presenting about the history and mystery of Pi to several groups of 8th and 9th graders in the Denver, Colorado area.  I’ve also written an article in defense of Pi Day for the current issue of Math Horizons Magazine, a publication of the Mathematical Association of America, in an issue with lots of other great Pi-related articles. (Read about the issue here; unfortunately, the content isn’t freely available online.)  Yes, someone actually wrote an anti-Pi Day article that I was asked to counter for the magazine.  Who could be against a day that helps so many kids get so excited about math?  I don’t think I need to convince you of this, given that you’re, um, presently reading a blog on a pi website.  Enough said!

What are you up to?  Now that we’re rolling into a fresh school week of Pi Days (2016-2019), I’m eager to hear more about the activities you’re doing with your students, how many digits they’re memorizing, and what kinds of pi tunes you’re rocking out to in class or in your spare time.  Post a comment here, or drop me a line!

By the way, if you ever needed help arguing for using precious class time, and brain bandwidth, to encourage your students or classmates to memorize digits of pi, check out this new story here on TeachPi.org.  Science to the rescue!

Rounded off or not,

Luke

Uh-Oh… Pi Day’s Getting Political?

/0 Comments/in , /by

Hi, Friends in Pi!

It’s the most wonderful time of the year! Another Pi Day is approaching, and while there’s not much mathematically special about 3/14/17 (except maybe for the fact that 3+14=17, but who’s counting?), this year’s holiday is apparently going to make a splash in an unexpected way. The news cycle on Pi Day 2017, when it isn’t making oft-used pi/pie puns while playing Pi Diddy’s rap, will likely be focused on a protest.

No, it’s not a protest of our beloved number. Who could ever protest Pi? Well, other than that Tau Manifesto guy or those ten naysayers back in ’09. Rather, it’s a political protest, planned by and for workers in science and technology fields. The center of the action will be the town square in Palo Alto, CA, where folks will gather for an event they’re calling “Tech Stands Up.” It officially kicks off at Pi Time, 1:59pm. They are expecting similar events to spring forth in other American cities too. Yep, you can’t make this stuff up.

(Incidentally, just 35 miles up the 101 into the heart of San Francisco, at the very same time, the Exploratorium will be marking its 30th annual Pi Day celebration with free admission and its usual over-the-top antics like the Pi Procession. Hey, this is the museum that is credited as the birthplace of Pi Day, so they’re allowed to celebrate it however they like!)

So anyway, as someone who likes to use Pi to bring us all together in an appreciation of the beauty of math, I’m not entirely sure how I feel about Pi Day becoming political. I suppose this isn’t actually the first time these two irrational entities have overlapped; once again, if you don’t know what happened in Congress in 2009, you might want to read that story, which happens to feature someone who is now the Vice President.

But co-opting Pi Day for politics is a bit of a slippery slope. What’s next? Legislating Pi’s value as exactly 2.9 after coercion from a local crackpot? Oh wait, that happened too, back in 1895. Misquoting Pi’s value under oath in a famous murder trial? Suing for the legal rights to Pi’s melody? Argh! Both also happened, and man, I need to write up and share some more of these stories! Trust me, the Stories section here at TeachPi.org is only a thin slice of Pi’s volumes of tales.

Anyway, it’s all pretty irrational, if you ask me. (Yes, pun once again intended.) If you need me, I’ll be lying low on Pi Day, just doing my normal thing and celebrating with a presentations and performances by my friend Pi Diddy at a local middle school. My favorite way to spend the day is, and always will be, using stories and silliness to help kids get a little more excited about math.

Enjoy your Pi Day, the 30th one on record (thanks again, Exploratorium!), and let me know where the day leads you — whether out onto the streets, into a festive classroom, or simply down a lovely stream of digits!

Luke

Pi Day ’18 – The Fun Never Ends (Nor Do The Digits…)

/0 Comments/in , /by

Hi, Pi pals!

We’ve endured nearly a full year since our last excuse to celebrate our favorite number, and now, well, we’re back! The math-holiday highlight of the months since the last Pi Day was most certainly the “e Day of the Century,” which we hit (and many of us likely missed) on 2.7.18. The number e, which math students know as the natural log, starts out 2.71828, so hey, February 7, 2018 was pretty much as good as it was going to get for that little guy. Happy belated e Day!

But back to the number of honor. Do you have any special plans this year? I’m pretty excited about mine. After years of admiring it from afar, I will be in attendance for the celebration at the birthplace of Pi Day, and on its 30th birthday, no less. Yes, the Exploratorium in San Francisco was where Pi Day is considered to have been founded, way back in 1988, and as a 20-year veteran of the holiday myself, I will finally get to see their unique tribute up close. Can’t wait! I’ll also be giving a talk on Pi for the math faculty and students at a nearby Bay Area university. Good times with friends of Pi.

If you’re a teacher, don’t forget to record your top students’ digit memory counts and send them in for consideration for TeachPi.org’s definitive K-12 rankings! We’re all waiting with bated breath for just how many digits the 5th phenom from Louisana, Adriana Martin, is going to bust out this year. Will anyone come close to filling her shoes in the younger grades, or fend her off as she blazes into the record books in her upcoming grades? Only time will tell. Go Adriana (and everyone else)!

Well, as always, if you have something particularly fun to share about your Pi Day, please share away! Otherwise, enjoy have a wonderful 3.14.18, and if you’ll be at the Exploratorium too, catch me for a hello!

Luke