The purpose of this post is to talk about the weekly math puzzle night dinners run by myself and my sidekick, Professor Miller, and to invite you to join us for this and other related activities. Here’s a quick summary of problem solving activities; for more information or to be added to the email list, contact me at [email protected].
- We have a weekly problem solving dinner at 5:30pm in the Dennett Private Dining Room at Mission on Wednesdays. There’s no prep work; feel free to drop in any time (and if you’re not on the meal plan we’ll provide a swipe). The way it works is we print out a math competition from somewhere in the world, and then brainstorm and attack the problems together.
- There are several math competitions each year. On October 31st we’ll travel to Middlebury and defend the Green Chicken. There’s also the Virginia Tech math competition (we’ll do this remotely Saturday October 24th), the Putnam exam (on Saturday December 5th) and the University of Rochester Math Olympiad (we’ll do this remotely mid February).
- We also frequently field teams for the Mathematical Contest in Modeling.
Many people love math puzzles or riddles. They’re often fun, frequently illustrate a beautiful concept or perspective, and unlike real world research problems they typically have an elegant answer. Come join us and experience a wonderful “aha” moment when you solve a problem.
For some more puzzles take a look at Professor Miller’s math riddles page (see http://mathriddles.williams.edu/). The problems and resources posted there for students and teachers are used in schools throughout the world, and if you’re interested in helping with the site drop him a line at [email protected].