Y is for "Yes! We Have No Bananas"

There were many good Y words like Youth, Years, Yellow, Yogurt, Yardstick, Yarn, and Yipee to write about, but every time I tried to think about a way to develop a post on one of them, the song, Yes! We Have No Bananas, was the only thing that popped into my head. Are you familiar with that song?

The song first became a hit in 1923 and has been recorded many times. (The Wiki Page needed more references, so I'm not going into any more of its history.) I first heard it in third grade, and I had to think twice about the meaning. The song was saying yes but meant no. I thought it was very clever.

Flash forward a few years to when I was learning about negative numbers, and I just couldn't understand how you could multiply two negative numbers and get a positive result. But Aunt Martha had the perfect words to describe it to me. She said, "I don't have no pencil. Do I have a pencil or not?" With those few words, it all made sense. I did have a pencil. That example reminded me of the banana song and the clever use of yes and no, and it seemed to be a good example for negative numbers, too. If you have a yes (positive number) combined with a no (negative number), the result is negative. There you have it. Simple math explained in a complicated way. :)

And now I have two posts in a row with a math theme (remember yesterday and using X as a math variable). Although granted, it's a weak theme, I may use it to finish up. So, can you guess what tomorrow's post will be about?

N is for No Pencil

N is for No Pencil

or Multiplying Negatives

I was in Mrs. Weekly's sixth grade math class and we were learning for the first time that when you multiply two negative numbers, you get a positive one. This was a concept I just couldn't wrap my head around. How in the world could two negatives make a positive? I questioned the teacher endlessly and her explanations never made sense to me.

Then one evening I asked my sister, Martha, how could you get a positive number when you multiplied two negatives. Without missing a beat, she simply said, "I don't have no pencil. Do I have a pencil or not?"

I thought about it for a couple of minutes, and then it was all crystal clear. She didn't have no pencil, so she must have a pencil. So that's how two negatives could become a positive. So simple.

Martha had a knack for saying just the right thing to make sense to me.  She seemed to speak my language, so I often went to her when I had a question about something. And she never disappointed.

Did you ever have someone who could explain things that made sense to you? Someone who spoke your language?

X is for X with a tail

Mr. Dimmick

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I had the same math teacher all four years of high school--Mr. Dimmick. He taught math in a very logical and systematic way--just as it should be. He also made it seem like a game. We learned the rules of the game, and then we knew how to play. It seemed as easy as that. And he was very careful to make sure that we knew the rules.

Anyone, who has done much algebra, knows that there can be a lot of steps involved in solving a problem. Mr. Dimmick insisted that we be very systematic with our steps including making the unknown X that we were solving for with a tail. That way it would not be confused with X that was used for multiplication. Now to most, this seemed like an overkill. In fact, I've never run into anyone who had a math teacher who was this strict with the details and steps that needed to be shown in a problem.

However, this attention to detail paid off for me in college. When I was in my first calculus class, there came a point in the middle of the semester where complicated equations had to be broken down algebraically so they could be easily integrated. Most everyone in the class was confused when they were trying to do this. In fact, the teacher handed out worksheets so students could practice algebra again. But I didn't need them. Mr. Dimmick's careful teachings were still with me. Including making a tail on every unknown X in the equations.

I'll have to admit, decades later, I do not remember all of the math that Mr. Dimmick taught me, but I do remember that he taught me well and making my X's with a tail was an important part of that.

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But wait there's more:

I remember a story Mr. Dimmick told one day about his four year old granddaughter. He asked her what zero meant. Her answer was, "That's when you don't hold up any fingers." He had a big grin as he told it and it made me smile too.