Friday, October 29, 2010

Toaster Remix

Dan's getting more mileage out of this problem than I am.  Either way, there are some good questions being asked re: pseudocontext, relevancy and so on.  So I'm curious, which one would you use and why?

(Note: don't check the answer until you've done the regression.  It's much more fun that way.)

The Original (setting 1,2 5 and 7)


Toaster Question from David Cox on Vimeo.


Or this?


Toaster Question (1-4) from David Cox on Vimeo.


Or this?


Toaster Question 2 (1-4) from David Cox on Vimeo.


The Answer


Toaster Answer from David Cox on Vimeo.

4 comments:

paulg said...

Did you go with the cold toaster approach in take 2? Level 3 and 4 clock in with significantly longer times than in the first take.

Paul Guilianelli

Sarah Cannon said...

I know Dan said to speed it up more, but I liked the pace of the original better. The fast ones are blinking so quickly that I don't start wondering the way I did at first. So I'd probably still use it even though I like having toasters 1-4.

Anonymous said...

1st - I understand now why you used 1,2,5,7.

I like the 3rd video, and I do like it sped up. One reason, it provides an access point for a non-mathematical student. I quickly felt the beat of the toaster popping, and I just counted out 4 more measures to get to the 8th setting. I was within a few seconds of the answer.
That makes me think of how to pull the math and tie it to the intuition, showing how math is a more natural process than it's usually presented.

Adam P. said...

Interesting work David! It was fun to watch your mind work as you kept adapting and thinking about instructional possibilities.

One thought: I know the first 4 settings don't get students as close to the setting 8 answer as desired with a linear model... but I think that is okay. It just leads to good questions..Why not? What can and can't we say about the relationship between the toaster settings and the cook time? Maybe after trying it with settings 1 - 4 and checking their prediction, students could then obtain and plot the times for all 8 settings and analyze the data as a visual whole. Now what can they conclude about the relationship?

One question I am wondering: When you do your tests with the cold toaster on different mornings, are your results the same? If not, what percent change takes place for cook time?

Anyway... Thanks for your postings :)