Probability session

This was the second time I've given this session. I think that it was an improvement. I went through the material a lot slower.
I thought that the handout exercise, although it was an improvement, could have been more interesting. At the least I think that the handout needs to be more fun looking. Maybe something to do with getting the pupils to interact with each other? They could maybe take a strawpoll of the rest of the class to estimate a probability on the line? Or they could come up with their own events that fit in to each of the boxes? or I could get them to stand in a line with an event and decide in what order they should stand in increasing probability? maybe 2 lines and make it a competition? This would need to have a definite order though. Could have markers, e.g. chairs, for 0,1,0.5 and get them to stand where they think the event should go?

Should have an extra slide at the end of the workshop of different job that use maths too.

Paper helicopters

I realise that i never redid the paper airplane stats thing i've done before. i'll see if any bodies up for it

Eureka

I saw the Times magazine Eureka and they had a feature called how magic works which made me think of doing something about the statistics of magic

http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/flash/eureka/

New year to do list

•   I plan on doing something for the EPQ on-line resources. The ideas are basic methods in presenting data and results (your own) and how to understand and critique results (someone elses). This second area ties in with the GetStats campaign currently run by the Royal Statistical Society (RSS) http://getstats.org.uk/index.html. I’ll try and get something down for the end of January. 
• Delivering the EPQ session. 
• Delivering the probability workshop to primary school kids early February. 
• Catch-up meeting bring workshop ideas for the Science and Engineering week (SEW), 50 mins.
• Help coordinating SEW.
• MAP conference involvement. 
• MAP tutoring.

Year 7 Challenge Demo Feedback

Following the demo of the Game Theory Challenge yesterday, I got some very useful feedback
The games were a little bit to complicated to explain quickly. A little more time will be needed to make the rules absolutely clear
The game took longer than I had thought and there wasn't enough time to wrap up properly. Should just stick to a couple of games
The main thing I think was the use of the sweets. I gave each player a pile of sweets to bet with. This meant that the players already had GAINED something so there was little incentive to play the games! If the prize was less than their pile they just folded early on. This was the case since the games are meant to show that they end up betting more than the pot.
A solution to this is to have the players play against the `banker' i.e. Ambassador so the banker holds all the sweets and then offers them at each turn.

I can't think of a way to auction without the players having their own stash so I've included the traveller's dilemma in its place.

I've also tried to make the Ambassador sheet a lot clearer. It basically a verbatim script now. I've bulleted most of the script and highlighted in a different colour exactly what is script and what is not.

Game theory 15 minutes challenge develpment

Potential games:
2/3 of the averageconsensus gameprisoners dilemmatravelers dilemmacentipede gamemuddy childrendollar auctionnumber battlesecretery/marriage problem
The focus of this should be how people think about risk. How do we weigh the pros and cons of what we've got relative to what we could have. How rational is our appreciation of the uncertainties about some outcome when there is something to be lost and gained.Examples of this thinking are seen in the Weakest Link and Who Wants to be a Millionaire. In the former it is the decision as to when to bank- should the contestant bank earlier to ensure some money banked or later to potentially bank more money but risk banking nothing? WWTBAM the contestant can walk away without playing the next question but may risk answering the question for a potentially significantly more amount of money.I think playing the centipede game with sweets could be a good interative game to start.then discuss the strategies usedwhy did they do what they didwhat did they learnwhat would they do differently next time.We want to develop an appreciation of individual levels of trust, risk aversion and selfishness.
Ground in day to day life: continuously making personal judgements in the present of uncertainty and risk. Whether is is going to rain, should we change job (probably not good for a school child!), should we cross the road, should we spend or money on item X, etc?
In business and politics the same thinking applies: should business X advertise more that business Y? should country X spend more on defence than country Y? should university X charge more fees??The marriage problem could be relevant to teenagers because of the dating element. How can we know whether to stick or continue?
The muddy children game can be played with post-it notes or coloured hats instead. This demonstrated what we learn when NOTHING happens.

Random number bias

Its been suggested to me to ask each pupil to write down a random number between 1 and 10. Then when they reveal these it is expected that most people pick either 3 or 7!

The Manchester Science Fair is focused on Maths this weekend and they've got the group working with Marcu Du Sautoy there, a maths comedian (!) and the maths busking.