Math Teacher
Tuesday, 05.23.06 @ 12:00AM 
In high school, I was assigned to a new math teacher named Joe. I knew Joe already, we were friends and neighbors, but I didn’t realize he was old enough to be a teacher! He dragged me through several classes, including one he just made up for me because I needed more math, but was not eligible to take trig my senior year. I asked how he was going to grade me. He said if I won the math competition at the science fair that year, he’d give me an A. I could see then that my grade point average was in danger. So I spent the year attending a consumer math class, while flipping coins to prove statistical theory (I also did my share of donut runs). I won the competition, and received my A! Joe had more confidence in me than I had in myself.
Joe has always been a great teacher and a great friend. But he’s also a musician, a comedian, a fishing nut, an ecologist, a newspaper columnist, and an all-around likeable guy. He recently won League of Kentucky Sportsmen's award for Conservation Educator of the Year 2006! Now I hear he has retired! HOW can a teacher who started out when I was in school be retired already?!? Oh yeah, I’m old, thats how. So I guess Joe is going to be spending more time in the mountains, fishing, picking, traveling, and making people laugh as always. Thanks for a great run at making educated people out of so many clueless kids.
HISTORICAL MATH
There were three medieval kingdoms on the shores of a lake. There was an island in the middle of the lake, over which the kingdoms had been fighting for years. Finally, the three kings decided that they would send their knights out to do battle, and the winner would take the island.
The night before the battle, the knights and their squires pitched camp and readied themselves for the fight. The first kingdom had 12 knights, and each knight had five squires, all of whom were busily polishing armor, brushing horses, and cooking food. The second kingdom had twenty knights, and each knight had 10 squires. Everyone at that camp was also busy preparing for battle. At the camp of the third kingdom, there was only one knight, with his squire. This squire took a large pot and hung it from a looped rope in a tall tree. He busied himself preparing the meal, while the knight polished his own armor.
When the hour of the battle came, the three kingdoms sent their squires out to fight (this was too trivial a matter for the knights to join in).
The battle raged, and when the dust had cleared, the only person left was the lone squire from the third kingdom, having defeated the squires from the other two kingdoms, thus proving that the squire of the high pot and noose is equal to the sum of the squires of the other two sides.
MATH IN THE NEWS
AP NEWS — At New York’s Kennedy airport today, an individual later discovered to be a public school teacher, was arrested trying to board a flight while in possession of a ruler, a protractor, a setsquare, a slide rule, and a calculator.
At a morning press conference, Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez said he believes the man is a member of the notorious Al-gebra movement. The FBI is charging him with carrying weapons of math instruction.
Al-gebra is a fearsome cult,” Gonzalez said. “They desire average solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on tangents in a search of absolute value. They use secret code names like ‘x’ and ‘y’ and refer to themselves as ‘unknowns’, but we have determined they belong to a common denominator of the axis of medieval with coordinates in every country. As the Greek philanderer Isosceles used to say, ‘there are 3 sides to every triangle’.”
When asked to comment on the arrest, President Bush said, “If God had wanted us to have better weapons of math instruction, he would have given us more fingers and toes."
More math jokes can be found here, here, and here.
Thought for today:
100 YEARS FROM NOW...
A hundred years from now,
it will not matter
what sort of house I lived in,
what my bank account was
or what kind of car I drove,
but the world may be different
because I was important
in the life of a child.
humor jokes teacher funny math mathematics retirement
Reader Comments (15)
--Weapons of math instruction ...
...squire of the high pot and noose ...
Fun post.
Excel does real good on those 4th grade calculations - it can probably do more - don't know - like Peggy Sue i decided i had no need for Math at this age.
It's good to see women achieving their math potential. I always knew they could.
Good for you, Miss Cellania, and thanks for the homage to your math teacher. Teachers are not valued enough, I think
Have a great day!
lucyd
I detested math in school. Always did, always will. Probably why I became a construction accountant, huh?
She always swore my days would be numbered...