Category Archives: Older students and adults

May
01
2015

Why Baltimore is so angry

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Baltimore is the biggest city close to our correspondants’ school in Towson.

Some parts of Baltimore are rich, some are a great tourist destination, but some parts of the city are poor and know many social problems. This explains part of some citizens’ reactions after Freddie Gray’s death under police custody last week.

▶ Why Baltimore Is So Angry – YouTube.

May
01
2015

Protests in New York over Freddie Gray’s death in Baltimore

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Freddy Gray, a young African American from Baltimore, died last week from serious injuries that he got while being transported in a police van.

There have been protest marches in Baltimore, some turning violent as rioters broke shop windows, attacked the police and burnt cars. Other members of the Baltimore community have called for peace.

Marches have now been led in memory of Freddie Gray, demanding justice, in other American cities.

▶ Protests in New York over Freddie Gray’s death in Baltimore – YouTube.

Mar
14
2015

Pi: 3,14… a magical number put into music

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As you might recall from math class, pi is the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter. This irrational number—approximately 3.14159—shows up quite frequently in many mathematical applications, including geometry and trigonometry.

The first attempts to calculate pi can be traced back to ancient Babylonians, who calculated the area of a circle as three times the square of its radius, making the value of pi equal to 3. One Babylonian tablet indicated they got as close as 3.125 and later calculations by the ancient Egyptians (ca. 1650 BC) approximated pi as 3.1605.

The number today is celebrated around the world on March 14, which when written out numerically is 3.14.

On YouTube, Michael Blake decided to pay tribute to Pi. By assigning a number to each musical note, he was able to create a composition by playing out the digits of pi. View the video of his piece below.

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