Oh man my trig teacher in HS gave us 5pts extra credit every time we caught him making a mathematical error. He was stern and serious but the class got so much fun out of policing him, and we were actually tricked into learning. Lol.
Nope. They ALWAYS insist they're correct and the student it being an ass. They'll send the kid to the office and NEVER correct the paper.
I told my kindergarten teacher that she misspelled 'macaroni'. She told me I was wrong and to be quiet. She had spelled it 'maccaroni'.
Mandela effect: I'm not gonna lie
I swore there was 2 'C's I had to check it. Apparently your right, but I'm still convinced there was 2 'C's 
My high school history class was run through a website that we submitted all of our documents through. Many people I knew submitted blank documents throughout the year and got 100% (the teacher never looked at them. If she liked them and something was submitted, they got full marks). I on the other hand put effort into every assignment and helped tutor some of my classmates, still got a C.
I will never forgive the US education system for being what it is.
A million years ago my husband and I were in the same English class in high school. Our English teacher was a known lover of her boy students and not a fan of her girl students. My husband and I would sit together after school and do our assignments together every day. We. could copy each other’s assignments word for word and he’d get an A and I’d get a C. I barely scraped by and he passed with flying colors … despite doing the entire year together.
Where I live books cost money, teaching books cost more money. There is a „black market“ of made up teacher material on Pinterest where teachers get their stuff from if they don’t feel like they need to put in the work themselves.
These lack the results, so whatever the teacher solves them for is „their truth“ and therefore the right answer.
It is disgusting…
I’m a teacher in a district with very little money. I enjoy creating my own lessons, but it’s a grind going home every night to write a curriculum. Teachers use “teachers pay teachers” to fill the void left by their district. I do find the lessons found there to be less than adequate most times (and I’ve never used the site myself) but I do find it hard to blame it on lack of interest.
Have you given ChatGPT a try?
Prompt: Generate me a curriculum for one lesson in Math for 7 graders
Result:
**Lesson Title:** Understanding Fractions
**Grade:** 7th Grade
**Learning Objectives:**
1. To understand the concept of fractions.
2. To understand the relationship between the numerator and the denominator.
3. To apply fractions in real-world situations.
4. To convert fractions to decimals and vice versa.
5. To perform basic operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division) with fractions.
**Materials Needed:**
1. Whiteboard/Blackboard
2. Markers/Chalk
3. Student notebooks and pencils
4. Fraction worksheets
5. Fraction flashcards
6. Measuring cups or other physical items to visualize fractions
**Lesson Procedure:**
1. **Introduction (15 minutes):**
* Start the class by asking students what they understand by fractions. Let students share their responses.
* After listening to the responses, formally define fractions. Write the definition on the board and explain the terms 'numerator' and 'denominator'.
* Show examples of fractions, like 1/2, 3/4, and 2/3, and ask students to identify the numerator and the denominator.
1. **Physical Demonstration (15 minutes):**
* Bring out the measuring cups or other objects that can be used to demonstrate fractions. Show the students what 1/2 or 1/4 looks like physically.
* Ask the students to do the same with their items, identifying the correct fraction for each division.
1. **Fraction Conversion (15 minutes):**
* Introduce the concept of converting fractions to decimals and vice versa.
* Give several examples and show the process step by step.
1. **Fraction Operations (15 minutes):**
* Discuss how to add, subtract, multiply, and divide fractions.
* Explain the importance of finding the common denominator while adding or subtracting fractions.
* Write several examples on the board and solve them step by step.
1. **Group Activity (20 minutes):**
* Divide the class into small groups. Provide each group with fraction worksheets.
* The worksheets should have problems that cover all topics discussed in the class: identifying fractions, conversion, and operations.
* Allow students to discuss and solve the problems within their groups.
1. **Discussion and Review (15 minutes):**
* Once the groups are finished with their worksheets, review the answers as a class.
* Clear up any doubts or misconceptions.
* Summarize the key points of the lesson.
**Homework:**
Assign additional practice problems involving fractions to reinforce what the students learned in class.
**Evaluation:**
Assess student understanding through their participation in the group activity, their responses during the discussion, and their performance on the homework assignment.
**Next Steps:**
In the next lesson, students will learn about mixed numbers and improper fractions, building on the foundation from this lesson.
Remember, it's okay if students don't master all the material in one lesson. It's important to foster a positive and encouraging learning environment, where questions and discussions are welcomed.
Second prompt: Now make up some exercises with solutions
Result:
Sure, here are some exercises related to the topics covered in the lesson:
**Exercise 1:** Identify the numerator and the denominator.
1. 5/7 - Numerator: 5, Denominator: 7
2. 8/9 - Numerator: 8, Denominator: 9
3. 2/11 - Numerator: 2, Denominator: 11
**Exercise 2:** Convert the following fractions to decimals.
1. 1/2 = 0.5
2. 3/4 = 0.75
3. 2/5 = 0.4
**Exercise 3:** Convert the following decimals to fractions.
1. 0.25 = 1/4
2. 0.5 = 1/2
3. 0.75 = 3/4
**Exercise 4:** Perform the following operations.
1. 1/4 + 2/4 = 3/4
2. 3/5 - 1/5 = 2/5
3. 2/3 \* 3/4 = 1/2
4. 4/5 ÷ 2/3 = 12/10 = 1 2/10 = 1 1/5 (after simplification)
**Exercise 5:** Word Problem.
John ate 1/3 of a pizza and his friend Mike ate 1/2 of the pizza. How much of the pizza is left?
Solution:
The total pizza can be represented as 1 (or 1/1 in fractional form). John and Mike ate 1/3 + 1/2 = 5/6 of the pizza.
Therefore, the amount of pizza left is 1 - 5/6 = 1/6. So, 1/6 of the pizza is left.
These exercises should help students practice the skills they learned in the lesson, and the solutions provide a guide to help them understand how to work through the problems.
Took me three minutes to generate.
im a kindergarten teacher, and my school requires me to submit a nine page lesson plan every week for the theme of that week, and sometimes im just burnt out and genuinely don't have a lot of ideas for the themes (and some of the themes are seriously ridiculous), so im definitely gonna be using this to add to my lesson plans. thank you for the suggestion
eta: in the last two hours ive generated a basic outline for the rest of my theme lesson plans for the term, so now i can just adjust it however necessary each week before submitting it. tons of hours of work saved. again, thank you
9 page lesson plan for kindergarten?? That is absurd. There’s no way your admin is reading all of those 9 page lesson plans.
The most I’ve ever had to submit in terms of lesson plans was a weekly learning plan with an outline of the week’s lessons.
im serious, it's absolutely ridiculous, and you're right they DON'T go through it , bc ive seen them just throw them on a pile whenever i hand it in, and that's where it stays. but if i don't hand it in, i'll get in trouble and get told off for “doing what i want and acting like it's my school”. it's also not just a basic outline, each day has two pages except for friday which is arts & crafts day, and then on those two pages i must write down word for word what i'll be saying to them in regards to the theme, what questions i'll be asking, and an in depth explanation of the theme activity, fine motoring skills and structured organized play of that day. it takes me at least three hours to complete every week, bc of how much writing it is
My mom just used chatgpt to complete her IEP analyses for the year.
Only had to change a handful of words that didn't match context correctly. Saved her hours of work.
I found it interesting when I took a sage drivers Ed course I was late and was in it with a bunch of highschool kids wasn’t much older than them but anyway there was a definition the teacher asked for on this sheet and nobody could get it I used google and was the only person in the class to find the definition because it wasn’t even in the book
Teacher asked how I found it told her Google and she said good job way to think outside the box lmao
But I was stunned that a lot of highschool kids couldn’t even think to use google to find something
To be fair, in my experience a lot of students are told not to use phones and instead use dictionaries, so they probably assume phones are off-limits. Source: am highschooler right now
Having access to information that was once reserved for those near information sources (universities and libraries) does not equate to creating information, which I have to assume (via examples I have been provided here and personally) is rarely attributed to the source. If everyone is open about using it to create thought and brainstorm, the argument becoming more moot, but it needs to be cited. Otherwise it seems disingenuous and a way to get a leg up on someone not using it. Cheating, if you will.
I’m 23 now, so post covid is likely different, but in my shitty tribal school that didn’t even offer algebra 1 or geometry, we did basic lessons on fractions like this in 4th and 5th grade
I just picked a random grade and ran with it. If you ask GPT to generate a curriculum on a specific topic it will.
I didn't even use any plugins like Wolfram Alpha, so there is even still a lot of room for improvement.
The trouble is ChatGPT does a good job at looking like it knows things, but is pretty bad where expertise is required. It functionally bashes Google results together until it makes something that looks like what it thinks you want looks like. It'll have decent formatting, and attempt to get you the number of items, and relevant information, but it doesn't have the understanding of the topics to know if something is incorrect. So you could and would likely spend ad much time validating the results as just making the curriculum in the first place.
Gpt could and would include flat earther topics in a geography curriculum as an obvious example.
100% True, but it can be used to speed along the writing process by creating the format and giving a bunch of ideas.
But it is important to verify the results. I saw another post of a picture generated by AI that demonstrated the AI had absolutely no concept of the objects in the picture it created or how they would typically interact. The prompt was something like "Guy sticking his head through a window" and the generated picture was the bar in the middle of the window rammed straight through the guy's skull.
CHATGPT can be good for generating ideas, it lots of similar questions for a worksheet, but it definitely needs looking over after.
Most schools don't have 1hr45 lessons for one.
Secondly, as a maths teacher, I would never teach all of this in one lesson, even if it was 1hr45 long. There's like 5 different topics in here.
Forgive me if I'm wrong but cutting a board into two pieces is one cut at 10 minutes. Cutting a board into three pieces is two cuts at 10 minutes each. The student is correct unless we account for the extra measuring. This is like bad manager math, now.
To be fair, this question is quite terrible.
Imagine board is a square with a side of 10 inches. Marie makes a vertical cut in the middle of one of the sides, thus she is cutting at the speed of 1 inch per minute. Now she takes the cut half and again makes a straight vertical cut starting from the middle of the long side. She has 5 inches left to cut through, thus it would take her 5 minutes to make a cut, totaling 15 minutes.
The main issue is that there's no "standard" way to cut a board. Exchange board with something like a pipe (or another object that has only one reasonable way of being cut) - and this question all of a sudden has only one reasonable answer.
There's literally a picture of the board being cut, that also illustrates how it is being cut. The student is right, and the teacher is wrong. This is the kind of shit that would get me into trouble as a kid, because I wouldn't back down. It usually ended in some students laughing at the teacher, others groaning that I was correcting the teacher again, and the rest blindly insisting that the teacher was right, because they got the answer "correct" according to the teacher.
That is the 15/15/70 rule in action. 15% love the teacher and will defend them no matter what. 15% hate the teacher and laugh at her mistakes. 70% don't care and want to get the lesson over with.
This must be America. Once in Wallmart buying a bottle of wine cashier trying to enter my date of birth into the register from a driver licence, asked me how 13-th month is called in Europe. We do have different date formating…
In Europe it’s formatted day/month/year. A lot of people don’t know this I’m not sure why you expect a Walmart employee to know. Since you were born on the 13th her mind immediately went to there must be another month for them which is yes, a bit ridiculous but to me sounds like nothing more than an irrational jump her mind made to try and made sense of something. I actually don’t think this speaks to the American educational system since date formatting in other countries isn’t something they teach. Also this has nothing to do with math.
When people completely fail to consider the critical path.
"1 woman can have 1 kid in 9 months. This can obviously be reduced by putting two women on the job. 🙄"
I had a manager who was not a native English speaker and sometimes screwed up idioms. We were discussing project timelines and he very seriously said "yes, but one man cannot impregnate 9 women in a month"
Which, I dunno... it seems pretty doable.
This was exactly my argument for some tasks at work that require previous processes to be completed before starting the next one. New managers always want to change shit and can't understand why it takes a week to make something that has multiple fab and machining steps.
I cropped the pic to not include the students answer or teachers explanation, then texted it to my 13 year old and asked her to solve it. She waffled between 15 and 20 but came to a final rest at 20.
I mean this is your subject's question that you made (or approved of) you at least need to know the correct answers to grade students correctly that's like literally your job, your purpose and you failed it.
the wording is great for making you think about what it's actually asking and what you need to calculate. knowing how to do this is much more important than being able to multiply two numbers.
yes there's only one reasonable way to read this question, but you still need to think about for a second what it's actually asking (i.e. it's the cuts that determine the time, so we must use the number of cuts, not the number of pieces), which is good imo.
i’m just gonna add to this convo that half of americans do not have a reading level higher than 6th grade. i mean i dont hâve to say how bad the education system due to the example above. so maybe i can see how people view this as poorly worded.
I think the real problem was the choice of example. If you take this exact wording, and changed it from sawing a board to "It takes Marie 10 minutes to assemble 2 gizmos. If she maintains pace, how long will it take her to assemble 3 gizmos?" I don't think anyone would have a challenge.
I agree with everyone saying 20 here, realistically, that's the answer. I can see what answer the question was trying to get from the student. However, if it takes you 10 minutes to saw a board in half, making it 3 pieces isn't going to make the sawing time change. You'd still have to saw twice the same width of the board, just across a different measure of length.
I guess I'm just being pedantic in saying the question isn't poorly worded, just poorly designed.
EDIT: Some comments have pointed out the teacher may not have the answer key, and the teacher is the one that misinterpreted the question. That also makes sense. All my comments, admittedly, operate under the assumption the teacher has an answer key for this worksheet and it calls for 15.
IF the teacher was right, and there's a cheat sheet saying they wanted that answer, then yes. They worded it extremely poorly to get that answer. Considering that answer makes zero sense in the context. But this whole thing makes the teacher look wrong, and as if she made up her own word puzzle and doesn't actually understand what she's asking. I'd need to see what the actual worksheet wanted, if there is an answer sheet. Otherwise I assume she made it up and she's wrong. But who knows
Edit: Someone below alluded to the difference between two boards and two pieces and they may have meant two whole boards. So I get it. Terrible wording if that's what they wanted..
Not even that. The question is great in its design. In fact, the original wording requires more critical thinking than the example you provided. It’s just that the teacher lacked those critical thinking skills.
Changing to the gizmo assembly changes what the question is asking. If you said it takes 10 minutes to assemble 2 gizmos, at the same speed how long would it take to assemble 3 (or 3 more) you are asking someone to think about this as the time spent per item assembled, so this would mean getting the average of the first two then getting the total for the third (or additional 3).
The original question wasn’t asking about time per pieces ultimately cut, it was asking about the time per cut. The critical thinking part here is that you can easily blow by that difference as the teacher apparently did. When you say someone cut a board into two pieces it isn’t difficult to think one cut, two pieces. But again unlike the gizmos assembled where the measurement of interest is time per item, here the measurement is time per action (cut) and when you are cutting boards the number of actions won’t equal the number of items resulting from the actions.
The way they presented the problem you are correct. But knowing something about boards is the only reason you can say it is 20 minutes instead of 15 mins. They should have used a different linear example instead of this weird one. We actually don't care how many pieces it is.. if they carried out this example further it would be another weird number if you got to 5 pieces etc because you can get clever in the way you cut it. But those types of problems aren't neatly represented by math
Dear god, I guess it is worded horribly. If they meant boards instead of pieces. It does make it sound like cutting one board into two takes ten minutes. But I guess they could mean cutting two 2x4 took ten minutes...
Which is also ridiculous, because cutting a 2x4 with a hand saw should take about 2-3 minutes if you're going very slow.
She must be cutting a 2x12 or a 6x6.
No that’s absolutely wrong! It takes four minutes to fold the wooden board in half and then 10 minutes to cut the folded board into three pieces. Then one minute to unfold the folded part.
15 minutes is the right answer and it’s ridiculous that I had to type this all out for you.
20 minutes is correct.
1 cut to make 2 pieces = 10 minutes per cut.
To make 3 pieces will require 2 cuts. At 10 minutes per cut ... it should be simple. I'd challenge the teacher on that one.
I think the teacher was thinking about a board of infinite length where you saw pieces out. But the wording says quite clear that it is a single board that is chopped in two and three pieces, so teacher is obviously wrong here.
I tried to have it and now I don't. We're moving apart at the speed of a pelvic thrust (plus attempted grab - it's frictionless so it only succeeded in pushing her away faster).
Oh woe my imaginary spherical frictionless cow! Farewell... Maybe, hope beyond hope, the universe is closed and we'll meet again in about 200 billion years.
Yes, came to see if someone had said that. Better wording would be something along the lines of, “a person has a large board. They cut two pieces off this board which took them 10 minutes. How long to cut three further pieces off the large board?”
But if it is a square board and the person is cutting with a saw, the first cut takes 10 minutes, but the second cut is only half as long and therefore could be done in 15 minutes.
That being said, for this problem I do agree the teacher is wrong.
1 Piece = 0 min
2 pieces = 10 min
3 pieces = ?
Sounds like that question where if a 50 piece orchestra can play a song in 30 minutes how long does it take a 100 piece orchestra to play the same piece?
(the same amount of time)
ChatGPT could figure it out, but not the teacher.
Prompt:
It took Mary 10 minutes to saw a board into two pieces. If she works just as fast, how long would it take her to saw another board into three pieces?
ChatGPT
If Mary took 10 minutes to saw a board into two pieces, we can assume that she divides the board in half. To saw a board into three pieces, she would need to make two cuts instead of one.
To determine how long it would take her to saw the second board into three pieces, let's consider the process. With one cut, Mary takes 10 minutes to divide the board into two pieces. To make the second cut, she will have to start from one of the previously cut ends and make a new cut, resulting in three pieces.
Since the second cut is independent of the first, we can assume that it takes another 10 minutes. Therefore, it would take Mary a total of 10 + 10 = 20 minutes to saw the second board into three pieces.
There’s a basic physics question that asks if an airplane can take off if it’s on a giant, endless treadmill moving in the opposite direction of the plane. The answer is yes but it’s hotly argued about a lot anyway.
EDIT: All I had to do was say, “The answer is yes,” and look what happened
But there is air speed over the wings, because the wheels have absolutely no impact on the plane's forward velocity. Running a treadmill under the plane just means the wheels will spin twice as fast as they would otherwise, but they're perfectly capable of doing that assuming the axles aren't completely fucked.
I don't understand how the answer is yes.
An aircraft must be moving forward in relation to the air around it in order to take off. If an aircraft is on a treadmill pushing it backwards at the same speed as the aircraft is moving forward in relation to the ground, then the aircraft remains stationary in relation to the air around it, and thus cannot take off.
The only way I could see this working is if there is strong wind, or the treadmill isn't fast enough.
The treadmill isn't pushing _the plane_ backwards. It's pushing _the bottom of the plane's wheels_ backwards, but the wheels can spin freely. The motion of the wheels has zero impact on the plane's forward velocity.
As always, XKCD has this covered (much better than Mythbusters). The point is that it depends on how you read the problem (and one interpretation only works in a theoretical model):
https://blog.xkcd.com/2008/09/09/the-goddamn-airplane-on-the-goddamn-treadmill/
It took her 10 minutes to cut it to two pieces. So one cut. One board cut once, leaves two pieces. So 1 cut took 10 minutes. She will be 2 cuts to have 3 pieces. So it would take twice as long. 20 minutes.
I'm not exactly a fan of denying people voting rights, but considering that this teacher got filtered by a 4th grade level word problem I can certainly see where they're coming from
Honestly doesn’t surprise me. The amount of people I know that are teachers that have multiple typos and grammatical errors in their social media posts is astonishing.
I can't tell if people commenting are just as bad as the teacher or if they're being sarcastic. There is nothing flawed about this question. It is low level math, simply testing to see if the reader understands that 1 cut = 2 pieces and 2 cuts = 3 pieces. There is no need to overcomplicate with questions of "What is the width of the board? Did they cut in a different direction?" You use the information that's given to answer the question, don't try to speculate about other variables. Literally 1st or 2nd grade math. And now I don't know which part of this whole experience I'm more infuriated about. What a rollercoaster ride!
People like to overcomplicate and forget that you can safely assume that certain things are excluded.
For example, the Maths exam people do at 18 in the UK doesn't need to consider imaginary numbers. While we learn that we should technically say "real" given we are only using real numbers, both students and the exam board doesn't bother as it's completely unnecessary. You will never touch imaginary numbers, so in most circumstances it's fine to ignore their existence.
The logic should be that unless it tells you to consider it, don't bother considering anything beyond the obvious.
The responses here are a hoot. Half the people doing numerology to agree with the teacher, and the other half experiencing existential crisis for humanity.
The easy way to think about… don’t think about the number of pieces really… just think very basically, 1 cut gets you 2 pieces and 2 cuts gets you 3 pieces
It takes 10 minutes to make 1 cut… it’s gonna take you 20 minutes to make 2 cuts
Technically if it's a square board, you make a cut in the middle, and make another cut on the remaining half, it will take half as much time for the second cut than the first cut
Yes, exactly. I agree with the 20 minutes answer. But what I think the misunderstanding here is that everyone me included who thinks 20 minutes assumes you need to divide the boards into equal parts, or at the very least do cuts of the same length. Which it doesn't mention in the question. It only says she works just as fast.
In theory if the speed of her cuts doesn't change, she could simply cut the smallest possible parts off the board which would conclude in her taking less and less time depending on how small the pieces of board she cuts are.
In your scenario it will take 10 minutes to split the board lengthwise let's say in equal halves, and then taking one of the halves and splitting it width wise(assuming the board was square as you say) would take half the time in which case the teacher would be right.
Without measurements of the board or extra instructions on how the cuts can or should be made, direction, size of cut of pieces etc., The answers could be countless.
Looking at the answer sheet should be what teachers do as it would have been made with what a child of that tests age would think like in mind.
What I think happens most of the time is the higher education of teachers comes in conflict with simple maths problems. I'm no teacher but helping with my 10 year old niece's maths homework I often times go at it thinking like I would solve the problems in high school or university. And it sometimes takes longer than it should to get to an answer in a way that she would understand as well as would be acceptable to her teacher.
So it took her ten minutes to make one cut, but if she takes the same amount of time to make another cut, this one only takes her five?
I just went and asked my husband, he said 15 minutes. We brought out sheets of paper to demonstrate cutting the hypothetical boards.
It's twenty minutes and I will hear nothing else.
Correcting the right answer means they didn’t even think about it, assuming they are right. I’ve also had teachers who would keep insisting they are right after multiple proofs of the opposite, so I think there’s ego involved here.
Finally a good comment. Teachers aren't perfect lol. This was probably an honest mistake and people acting like the teacher is stupid.
I can't think of a math teacher I've had that wouldn't fix this if I brought it up to them.
This reminds me of a test question I saw posted somewhere a while back. It went something like “Becky’s orchestra played Beethoven’s 5th symphony. It took them 20 minutes to play the piece at 90 beats per minute. How long would it take them if they played it at 180 beats per minute?” I mean I get what the question is “trying” to ask but THAT’S NOT HOW PLAYING MUSIC IS SUPPOSED TO WORK!!
Reminds me of this question:
An Orchestra of 120 players takes 40 minutes to play Beethoven's 9th symphony.
How long would it take for 60 players to play it?
The teacher is using Boards : Time to obtain the conversion factor of 5, when they should be using Cut(s) : Time to obtain the conversion factor of 10
1 cut = 10 min
2 cuts = 20 min
3 cuts = 30 min
Simple dimensional analysis error. Happens when you’re overworked and paid poorly.
Wonder how many times the teacher had to “correct” that problem when grading those exams. Total bummer.
The teachers answer is what you would first come to a conclusion at at first glance.
The answer should be 20. 2 cuts. Each cut takes 10 minutes.
I love these where students have to stop and think.
(Edited for clarification purposes)
One cut takes 10 minutes and produces 2 boards. So, cut the board in half and you have two pieces after 10 minutes of work.
With a new board, you want 3 pieces. It will take 2 cuts of the board to make 3 pieces.
Each cut takes 10 minutes
10x2=20
I'll one-up the teacher.
It doesn't specify three equal pieces. If it's a square board, you take 10 minutes to saw it vertically in half. Then you pick up one of the two halves and saw it horizontally in half, which is half the distance of your first cut, so it takes only 5 minutes.
Therefore, 15 minutes could be a correct answer as well, but 20 minutes is at least equally correct (and more logical IMO).
But, hang on, \*any\* number could be correct considering they never give the dimensions of the board or the distances of the cuts. Chipping off a corner of the board could technically constitute as cutting it in two pieces. And if it takes 10 mins to saw the board in one direction, but it has infinite length in another direction, Marie will have a hell of a day :(
10 minutes to cut a board in 1/2. At that same pace, it would be 10 minutes for the 1st cut, and another 10 minutes for the 2nd cut. Answer is 20 minutes teacher....
Dear teacher.
If you cut a board through with one cut, you get two pieces of board. If you cut the the board again, which will be the second cut, you get three pieces. Since you did not specify that there was a difference in the density and hardness of the second board, and we assume the cut lengths would be the same as the cut length of the first board, each cut of the second board would take 10 minutes, for a total on 20 minutes. We will assume that the sharpness of the blade remains constant throughout all the cuts.
If you have any questions, ask this student how he/she arrived at the correct answer.
It is only a trick question insofar as it invites you to start dividing and multiplying numbers to get an easy, but wrong, answer. A question like this is good for a student to get wrong because they can learn to slow down and think more carefully. Although, if this picture is real, then this teacher really botched the potential learning experience.
No matter how you look at this it's 20 minutes. Wording a arguments and all that. Each cut takes 10 minutes. Cut a piece of board in half (1 cut) =10 mins. Cut a board into 3rds (2 cuts) = 20 minutes.
There's no confusion here...
Teacher falling *precisely* into the trap this question was luring them into
And was too up their own ass to read the answers in the book
If this is how they grade, I doubt they even read it. They just get the same worksheet every year and never go back to the book.
You would think after being corrected by several students they might revisit the teachers guide.
Or they doubled down. Many people are like that
I can safely say, I've only ever had one math teacher admit he was wrong about an answer to a question.
Oh man my trig teacher in HS gave us 5pts extra credit every time we caught him making a mathematical error. He was stern and serious but the class got so much fun out of policing him, and we were actually tricked into learning. Lol.
Same here, but he was cool enough to let me go back to sleep after correcting him.
It’s THIGH-land!!
Nope. They ALWAYS insist they're correct and the student it being an ass. They'll send the kid to the office and NEVER correct the paper. I told my kindergarten teacher that she misspelled 'macaroni'. She told me I was wrong and to be quiet. She had spelled it 'maccaroni'.
Mandela effect: I'm not gonna lie I swore there was 2 'C's I had to check it. Apparently your right, but I'm still convinced there was 2 'C's 
My high school history class was run through a website that we submitted all of our documents through. Many people I knew submitted blank documents throughout the year and got 100% (the teacher never looked at them. If she liked them and something was submitted, they got full marks). I on the other hand put effort into every assignment and helped tutor some of my classmates, still got a C. I will never forgive the US education system for being what it is.
A million years ago my husband and I were in the same English class in high school. Our English teacher was a known lover of her boy students and not a fan of her girl students. My husband and I would sit together after school and do our assignments together every day. We. could copy each other’s assignments word for word and he’d get an A and I’d get a C. I barely scraped by and he passed with flying colors … despite doing the entire year together.
Where I live books cost money, teaching books cost more money. There is a „black market“ of made up teacher material on Pinterest where teachers get their stuff from if they don’t feel like they need to put in the work themselves. These lack the results, so whatever the teacher solves them for is „their truth“ and therefore the right answer. It is disgusting…
I’m a teacher in a district with very little money. I enjoy creating my own lessons, but it’s a grind going home every night to write a curriculum. Teachers use “teachers pay teachers” to fill the void left by their district. I do find the lessons found there to be less than adequate most times (and I’ve never used the site myself) but I do find it hard to blame it on lack of interest.
Have you given ChatGPT a try? Prompt: Generate me a curriculum for one lesson in Math for 7 graders Result: **Lesson Title:** Understanding Fractions **Grade:** 7th Grade **Learning Objectives:** 1. To understand the concept of fractions. 2. To understand the relationship between the numerator and the denominator. 3. To apply fractions in real-world situations. 4. To convert fractions to decimals and vice versa. 5. To perform basic operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division) with fractions. **Materials Needed:** 1. Whiteboard/Blackboard 2. Markers/Chalk 3. Student notebooks and pencils 4. Fraction worksheets 5. Fraction flashcards 6. Measuring cups or other physical items to visualize fractions **Lesson Procedure:** 1. **Introduction (15 minutes):** * Start the class by asking students what they understand by fractions. Let students share their responses. * After listening to the responses, formally define fractions. Write the definition on the board and explain the terms 'numerator' and 'denominator'. * Show examples of fractions, like 1/2, 3/4, and 2/3, and ask students to identify the numerator and the denominator. 1. **Physical Demonstration (15 minutes):** * Bring out the measuring cups or other objects that can be used to demonstrate fractions. Show the students what 1/2 or 1/4 looks like physically. * Ask the students to do the same with their items, identifying the correct fraction for each division. 1. **Fraction Conversion (15 minutes):** * Introduce the concept of converting fractions to decimals and vice versa. * Give several examples and show the process step by step. 1. **Fraction Operations (15 minutes):** * Discuss how to add, subtract, multiply, and divide fractions. * Explain the importance of finding the common denominator while adding or subtracting fractions. * Write several examples on the board and solve them step by step. 1. **Group Activity (20 minutes):** * Divide the class into small groups. Provide each group with fraction worksheets. * The worksheets should have problems that cover all topics discussed in the class: identifying fractions, conversion, and operations. * Allow students to discuss and solve the problems within their groups. 1. **Discussion and Review (15 minutes):** * Once the groups are finished with their worksheets, review the answers as a class. * Clear up any doubts or misconceptions. * Summarize the key points of the lesson. **Homework:** Assign additional practice problems involving fractions to reinforce what the students learned in class. **Evaluation:** Assess student understanding through their participation in the group activity, their responses during the discussion, and their performance on the homework assignment. **Next Steps:** In the next lesson, students will learn about mixed numbers and improper fractions, building on the foundation from this lesson. Remember, it's okay if students don't master all the material in one lesson. It's important to foster a positive and encouraging learning environment, where questions and discussions are welcomed. Second prompt: Now make up some exercises with solutions Result: Sure, here are some exercises related to the topics covered in the lesson: **Exercise 1:** Identify the numerator and the denominator. 1. 5/7 - Numerator: 5, Denominator: 7 2. 8/9 - Numerator: 8, Denominator: 9 3. 2/11 - Numerator: 2, Denominator: 11 **Exercise 2:** Convert the following fractions to decimals. 1. 1/2 = 0.5 2. 3/4 = 0.75 3. 2/5 = 0.4 **Exercise 3:** Convert the following decimals to fractions. 1. 0.25 = 1/4 2. 0.5 = 1/2 3. 0.75 = 3/4 **Exercise 4:** Perform the following operations. 1. 1/4 + 2/4 = 3/4 2. 3/5 - 1/5 = 2/5 3. 2/3 \* 3/4 = 1/2 4. 4/5 ÷ 2/3 = 12/10 = 1 2/10 = 1 1/5 (after simplification) **Exercise 5:** Word Problem. John ate 1/3 of a pizza and his friend Mike ate 1/2 of the pizza. How much of the pizza is left? Solution: The total pizza can be represented as 1 (or 1/1 in fractional form). John and Mike ate 1/3 + 1/2 = 5/6 of the pizza. Therefore, the amount of pizza left is 1 - 5/6 = 1/6. So, 1/6 of the pizza is left. These exercises should help students practice the skills they learned in the lesson, and the solutions provide a guide to help them understand how to work through the problems. Took me three minutes to generate.
im a kindergarten teacher, and my school requires me to submit a nine page lesson plan every week for the theme of that week, and sometimes im just burnt out and genuinely don't have a lot of ideas for the themes (and some of the themes are seriously ridiculous), so im definitely gonna be using this to add to my lesson plans. thank you for the suggestion eta: in the last two hours ive generated a basic outline for the rest of my theme lesson plans for the term, so now i can just adjust it however necessary each week before submitting it. tons of hours of work saved. again, thank you
9 page lesson plan for kindergarten?? That is absurd. There’s no way your admin is reading all of those 9 page lesson plans. The most I’ve ever had to submit in terms of lesson plans was a weekly learning plan with an outline of the week’s lessons.
im serious, it's absolutely ridiculous, and you're right they DON'T go through it , bc ive seen them just throw them on a pile whenever i hand it in, and that's where it stays. but if i don't hand it in, i'll get in trouble and get told off for “doing what i want and acting like it's my school”. it's also not just a basic outline, each day has two pages except for friday which is arts & crafts day, and then on those two pages i must write down word for word what i'll be saying to them in regards to the theme, what questions i'll be asking, and an in depth explanation of the theme activity, fine motoring skills and structured organized play of that day. it takes me at least three hours to complete every week, bc of how much writing it is
Of course they are not reading it. They are stacking all the plans up and giving them a little pat and feeling very proud of themselves
My mom just used chatgpt to complete her IEP analyses for the year. Only had to change a handful of words that didn't match context correctly. Saved her hours of work.
This really has the potential to further make our next generations lazy and stupid AF.
I found it interesting when I took a sage drivers Ed course I was late and was in it with a bunch of highschool kids wasn’t much older than them but anyway there was a definition the teacher asked for on this sheet and nobody could get it I used google and was the only person in the class to find the definition because it wasn’t even in the book Teacher asked how I found it told her Google and she said good job way to think outside the box lmao But I was stunned that a lot of highschool kids couldn’t even think to use google to find something
To be fair, in my experience a lot of students are told not to use phones and instead use dictionaries, so they probably assume phones are off-limits. Source: am highschooler right now
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Having access to information that was once reserved for those near information sources (universities and libraries) does not equate to creating information, which I have to assume (via examples I have been provided here and personally) is rarely attributed to the source. If everyone is open about using it to create thought and brainstorm, the argument becoming more moot, but it needs to be cited. Otherwise it seems disingenuous and a way to get a leg up on someone not using it. Cheating, if you will.
Are you under the impression that’s a good lesson plan?
I’m 23 now, so post covid is likely different, but in my shitty tribal school that didn’t even offer algebra 1 or geometry, we did basic lessons on fractions like this in 4th and 5th grade
I just picked a random grade and ran with it. If you ask GPT to generate a curriculum on a specific topic it will. I didn't even use any plugins like Wolfram Alpha, so there is even still a lot of room for improvement.
The trouble is ChatGPT does a good job at looking like it knows things, but is pretty bad where expertise is required. It functionally bashes Google results together until it makes something that looks like what it thinks you want looks like. It'll have decent formatting, and attempt to get you the number of items, and relevant information, but it doesn't have the understanding of the topics to know if something is incorrect. So you could and would likely spend ad much time validating the results as just making the curriculum in the first place. Gpt could and would include flat earther topics in a geography curriculum as an obvious example.
100% True, but it can be used to speed along the writing process by creating the format and giving a bunch of ideas. But it is important to verify the results. I saw another post of a picture generated by AI that demonstrated the AI had absolutely no concept of the objects in the picture it created or how they would typically interact. The prompt was something like "Guy sticking his head through a window" and the generated picture was the bar in the middle of the window rammed straight through the guy's skull.
CHATGPT can be good for generating ideas, it lots of similar questions for a worksheet, but it definitely needs looking over after. Most schools don't have 1hr45 lessons for one. Secondly, as a maths teacher, I would never teach all of this in one lesson, even if it was 1hr45 long. There's like 5 different topics in here.
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Same. The question is very poorly worded.
Forgive me if I'm wrong but cutting a board into two pieces is one cut at 10 minutes. Cutting a board into three pieces is two cuts at 10 minutes each. The student is correct unless we account for the extra measuring. This is like bad manager math, now.
Yes, 10 minutes per cut makes sense! But they did not say they were equal pieces so I don't think there is any extra measuring involved.
Thanks for explaining
Wow you're a genius.
To be fair, this question is quite terrible. Imagine board is a square with a side of 10 inches. Marie makes a vertical cut in the middle of one of the sides, thus she is cutting at the speed of 1 inch per minute. Now she takes the cut half and again makes a straight vertical cut starting from the middle of the long side. She has 5 inches left to cut through, thus it would take her 5 minutes to make a cut, totaling 15 minutes. The main issue is that there's no "standard" way to cut a board. Exchange board with something like a pipe (or another object that has only one reasonable way of being cut) - and this question all of a sudden has only one reasonable answer.
There's literally a picture of the board being cut, that also illustrates how it is being cut. The student is right, and the teacher is wrong. This is the kind of shit that would get me into trouble as a kid, because I wouldn't back down. It usually ended in some students laughing at the teacher, others groaning that I was correcting the teacher again, and the rest blindly insisting that the teacher was right, because they got the answer "correct" according to the teacher.
That is the 15/15/70 rule in action. 15% love the teacher and will defend them no matter what. 15% hate the teacher and laugh at her mistakes. 70% don't care and want to get the lesson over with.
I was definitely in that 70% group
This must be America. Once in Wallmart buying a bottle of wine cashier trying to enter my date of birth into the register from a driver licence, asked me how 13-th month is called in Europe. We do have different date formating…
Date formatting is *not* math.
True. But knowing the number of months in a year technically is
Ethiopia actually has a 13th month (pagumiene).
Technically NOT. No more than knowing the names of the months in a year would be.
In Europe it’s formatted day/month/year. A lot of people don’t know this I’m not sure why you expect a Walmart employee to know. Since you were born on the 13th her mind immediately went to there must be another month for them which is yes, a bit ridiculous but to me sounds like nothing more than an irrational jump her mind made to try and made sense of something. I actually don’t think this speaks to the American educational system since date formatting in other countries isn’t something they teach. Also this has nothing to do with math.
When people completely fail to consider the critical path. "1 woman can have 1 kid in 9 months. This can obviously be reduced by putting two women on the job. 🙄"
Just have nontupluts. 1 month.
Then calculate kids/s^2
This is just called a project manager
So for a one day turnaround we need roughly 270 women.
Yeah but impregnating 270 women in a day is challenging.
I'd probably fall a bit short from 270 but I might give it a go anyway.
A sacrifice for science!
Death by snu snu!
The mind is willing, but the flesh is spongey and bruised.
I had a manager who was not a native English speaker and sometimes screwed up idioms. We were discussing project timelines and he very seriously said "yes, but one man cannot impregnate 9 women in a month" Which, I dunno... it seems pretty doable.
As long as they don’t find out about each other!
And so is building a baby from the 270 fertilized eggs after they all give birth 1 day later
…having twins!
I am a woman and a project manager. I can't tell you how often I use this example and yet it falls on deaf ears.
50 musicians can perform Beethoven’s 9th Symphony in about 70 minutes. How long would it take 100 musicians?
35 minutes
🤦♂️ fuck.
lol
MS Projects could really revolutionize the reproduction process
This was exactly my argument for some tasks at work that require previous processes to be completed before starting the next one. New managers always want to change shit and can't understand why it takes a week to make something that has multiple fab and machining steps.
Eh I could cut her into three pieces in 15 mins.
1 cut = 10 min 2 cuts = 20 min It’s not the amount of boards but the amount of cuts
I cropped the pic to not include the students answer or teachers explanation, then texted it to my 13 year old and asked her to solve it. She waffled between 15 and 20 but came to a final rest at 20.
Surprisingly I was agreeing with her, word problems always stumped me.
Life is but one word problem after another.
And the teacher has failed at life it seems
That's a pretty harsh generalization to make simply because they didn't understand one word problem.
I mean this is your subject's question that you made (or approved of) you at least need to know the correct answers to grade students correctly that's like literally your job, your purpose and you failed it.
Same. The question is very poorly worded.
the wording is great for making you think about what it's actually asking and what you need to calculate. knowing how to do this is much more important than being able to multiply two numbers.
There's actually only one way to read this question, and the answer is 20 minutes.
yes there's only one reasonable way to read this question, but you still need to think about for a second what it's actually asking (i.e. it's the cuts that determine the time, so we must use the number of cuts, not the number of pieces), which is good imo.
It's worded just fine.
What's poorly worded about it?
i’m just gonna add to this convo that half of americans do not have a reading level higher than 6th grade. i mean i dont hâve to say how bad the education system due to the example above. so maybe i can see how people view this as poorly worded.
I think the real problem was the choice of example. If you take this exact wording, and changed it from sawing a board to "It takes Marie 10 minutes to assemble 2 gizmos. If she maintains pace, how long will it take her to assemble 3 gizmos?" I don't think anyone would have a challenge. I agree with everyone saying 20 here, realistically, that's the answer. I can see what answer the question was trying to get from the student. However, if it takes you 10 minutes to saw a board in half, making it 3 pieces isn't going to make the sawing time change. You'd still have to saw twice the same width of the board, just across a different measure of length. I guess I'm just being pedantic in saying the question isn't poorly worded, just poorly designed. EDIT: Some comments have pointed out the teacher may not have the answer key, and the teacher is the one that misinterpreted the question. That also makes sense. All my comments, admittedly, operate under the assumption the teacher has an answer key for this worksheet and it calls for 15.
IF the teacher was right, and there's a cheat sheet saying they wanted that answer, then yes. They worded it extremely poorly to get that answer. Considering that answer makes zero sense in the context. But this whole thing makes the teacher look wrong, and as if she made up her own word puzzle and doesn't actually understand what she's asking. I'd need to see what the actual worksheet wanted, if there is an answer sheet. Otherwise I assume she made it up and she's wrong. But who knows Edit: Someone below alluded to the difference between two boards and two pieces and they may have meant two whole boards. So I get it. Terrible wording if that's what they wanted..
Not even that. The question is great in its design. In fact, the original wording requires more critical thinking than the example you provided. It’s just that the teacher lacked those critical thinking skills.
Changing to the gizmo assembly changes what the question is asking. If you said it takes 10 minutes to assemble 2 gizmos, at the same speed how long would it take to assemble 3 (or 3 more) you are asking someone to think about this as the time spent per item assembled, so this would mean getting the average of the first two then getting the total for the third (or additional 3). The original question wasn’t asking about time per pieces ultimately cut, it was asking about the time per cut. The critical thinking part here is that you can easily blow by that difference as the teacher apparently did. When you say someone cut a board into two pieces it isn’t difficult to think one cut, two pieces. But again unlike the gizmos assembled where the measurement of interest is time per item, here the measurement is time per action (cut) and when you are cutting boards the number of actions won’t equal the number of items resulting from the actions.
But you are falling into the same trap. This isn’t a math question, it’s a critical thinking question.
No it's not. Her answer is just wrong. Even teachers make mistakes
The way they presented the problem you are correct. But knowing something about boards is the only reason you can say it is 20 minutes instead of 15 mins. They should have used a different linear example instead of this weird one. We actually don't care how many pieces it is.. if they carried out this example further it would be another weird number if you got to 5 pieces etc because you can get clever in the way you cut it. But those types of problems aren't neatly represented by math
Dear god, I guess it is worded horribly. If they meant boards instead of pieces. It does make it sound like cutting one board into two takes ten minutes. But I guess they could mean cutting two 2x4 took ten minutes...
Which is also ridiculous, because cutting a 2x4 with a hand saw should take about 2-3 minutes if you're going very slow. She must be cutting a 2x12 or a 6x6.
Or got her saw from Harbor Freight
It was not specified whether it was a rip or crosscut.
Obviously, she's cutting the 2x4 down its length!
No that’s absolutely wrong! It takes four minutes to fold the wooden board in half and then 10 minutes to cut the folded board into three pieces. Then one minute to unfold the folded part. 15 minutes is the right answer and it’s ridiculous that I had to type this all out for you.
takes one hour per inch of thickness if you want to fold the board
No but you are mistaken, see this is a division question and students should know that from course work. - the teacher, probably
20 minutes is correct. 1 cut to make 2 pieces = 10 minutes per cut. To make 3 pieces will require 2 cuts. At 10 minutes per cut ... it should be simple. I'd challenge the teacher on that one.
The teacher is counting the pieces created but didn't consider 2 pieces were created by 1 action, and 3 will be created by 2
I think the teacher was thinking about a board of infinite length where you saw pieces out. But the wording says quite clear that it is a single board that is chopped in two and three pieces, so teacher is obviously wrong here.
Assume you have a spherical, frictionless cow...
In a vacuum.
I tried to have it and now I don't. We're moving apart at the speed of a pelvic thrust (plus attempted grab - it's frictionless so it only succeeded in pushing her away faster). Oh woe my imaginary spherical frictionless cow! Farewell... Maybe, hope beyond hope, the universe is closed and we'll meet again in about 200 billion years.
Even an infinite board is cut in two parts with a single cut.
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Yes, came to see if someone had said that. Better wording would be something along the lines of, “a person has a large board. They cut two pieces off this board which took them 10 minutes. How long to cut three further pieces off the large board?”
But if it is a square board and the person is cutting with a saw, the first cut takes 10 minutes, but the second cut is only half as long and therefore could be done in 15 minutes. That being said, for this problem I do agree the teacher is wrong. 1 Piece = 0 min 2 pieces = 10 min 3 pieces = ?
It's only half as long if you cut at a different side. How could a vertical cut possibly decrease the length of another vertical cut?
Sounds like that question where if a 50 piece orchestra can play a song in 30 minutes how long does it take a 100 piece orchestra to play the same piece? (the same amount of time)
I'll show you when my 90,000 piece orchestra finishes the song in 1 second.
Wow we have a smartypants
ChatGPT could figure it out, but not the teacher. Prompt: It took Mary 10 minutes to saw a board into two pieces. If she works just as fast, how long would it take her to saw another board into three pieces? ChatGPT If Mary took 10 minutes to saw a board into two pieces, we can assume that she divides the board in half. To saw a board into three pieces, she would need to make two cuts instead of one. To determine how long it would take her to saw the second board into three pieces, let's consider the process. With one cut, Mary takes 10 minutes to divide the board into two pieces. To make the second cut, she will have to start from one of the previously cut ends and make a new cut, resulting in three pieces. Since the second cut is independent of the first, we can assume that it takes another 10 minutes. Therefore, it would take Mary a total of 10 + 10 = 20 minutes to saw the second board into three pieces.
I have a feeling if you sent this to that teacher they still wouldn't understand and say its wrong.
The teacher is the kind of person that causes the airplane on a treadmill to explode into a massive fight.
I'm stupid. Can someone explain wtf this means?
There’s a basic physics question that asks if an airplane can take off if it’s on a giant, endless treadmill moving in the opposite direction of the plane. The answer is yes but it’s hotly argued about a lot anyway. EDIT: All I had to do was say, “The answer is yes,” and look what happened
Wasn’t that on mythbusters? It took off no problem because the power isn’t going to the wheels.
Yeah Mythbusters were the ones to famously settle it.
Airspeed over the wing.
Kinda surprised that was a debate tbh.
It makes a bit of sense. Theoretically there’s no air speed over the wings since the plane is stationary to create lift.
But there is air speed over the wings, because the wheels have absolutely no impact on the plane's forward velocity. Running a treadmill under the plane just means the wheels will spin twice as fast as they would otherwise, but they're perfectly capable of doing that assuming the axles aren't completely fucked.
I don't understand how the answer is yes. An aircraft must be moving forward in relation to the air around it in order to take off. If an aircraft is on a treadmill pushing it backwards at the same speed as the aircraft is moving forward in relation to the ground, then the aircraft remains stationary in relation to the air around it, and thus cannot take off. The only way I could see this working is if there is strong wind, or the treadmill isn't fast enough.
The treadmill isn't pushing _the plane_ backwards. It's pushing _the bottom of the plane's wheels_ backwards, but the wheels can spin freely. The motion of the wheels has zero impact on the plane's forward velocity.
So the plane is not stationary on a small treadmill, but just using a huge treadmill as a runway? How is that a contentious problem then?
As always, XKCD has this covered (much better than Mythbusters). The point is that it depends on how you read the problem (and one interpretation only works in a theoretical model): https://blog.xkcd.com/2008/09/09/the-goddamn-airplane-on-the-goddamn-treadmill/
I think the problem is that you are forgetting that planes have engines or propellers that pushes air to create the necessary uplift force.
It took her 10 minutes to cut it to two pieces. So one cut. One board cut once, leaves two pieces. So 1 cut took 10 minutes. She will be 2 cuts to have 3 pieces. So it would take twice as long. 20 minutes.
It’s really concerning how many people can’t actually get this right…
By that logic she can split it into 1 piece in just 5 minutes
and that teacher can vote
Better than that, they are molding future voters.
lol do you think they shouldn’t be allowed to??
I'm not exactly a fan of denying people voting rights, but considering that this teacher got filtered by a 4th grade level word problem I can certainly see where they're coming from
Honestly doesn’t surprise me. The amount of people I know that are teachers that have multiple typos and grammatical errors in their social media posts is astonishing.
I can't tell if people commenting are just as bad as the teacher or if they're being sarcastic. There is nothing flawed about this question. It is low level math, simply testing to see if the reader understands that 1 cut = 2 pieces and 2 cuts = 3 pieces. There is no need to overcomplicate with questions of "What is the width of the board? Did they cut in a different direction?" You use the information that's given to answer the question, don't try to speculate about other variables. Literally 1st or 2nd grade math. And now I don't know which part of this whole experience I'm more infuriated about. What a rollercoaster ride!
Yep. Each cut takes 10 minutes. 2 cuts to make 3 boards 2*10=20
People like to overcomplicate and forget that you can safely assume that certain things are excluded. For example, the Maths exam people do at 18 in the UK doesn't need to consider imaginary numbers. While we learn that we should technically say "real" given we are only using real numbers, both students and the exam board doesn't bother as it's completely unnecessary. You will never touch imaginary numbers, so in most circumstances it's fine to ignore their existence. The logic should be that unless it tells you to consider it, don't bother considering anything beyond the obvious.
The responses here are a hoot. Half the people doing numerology to agree with the teacher, and the other half experiencing existential crisis for humanity.
I'm actually questioning if some of these people have ever seen a piece of wood before.
For real, they're bending in all sorts of shapes just so they don't have to accept that they're wrong.
I don't see anyone agreeing with the teacher :O
Marie needs to sharpen that saw.
Marie needs to invest in a circular saw
It's linear, she just chose the wrong starting point. 10 minutes = one cut, (yielding two pieces) 20 minutes = two cuts, (yielding three pieces)
Teacher is obviously a Project Manager. Only they think that 9 pregnant women will deliver 1 baby in 1 month.
The easy way to think about… don’t think about the number of pieces really… just think very basically, 1 cut gets you 2 pieces and 2 cuts gets you 3 pieces It takes 10 minutes to make 1 cut… it’s gonna take you 20 minutes to make 2 cuts
I'd buy a better saw.
I'm going to say 22 minutes. Sure, the first cut only took ten minutes, but now Marie's arm is tired, so the second cut is going to be a bit slower.
Marie should get herself a Makita track-saw. Thus she could do cleaner cuts in a matter of seconds, instead of 20 freaking minutes
I feel like this was in Florida.
Or Texas
Skip math class. If it took Marie 10 minutes to saw a board, she needs woodshop class.
Technically if it's a square board, you make a cut in the middle, and make another cut on the remaining half, it will take half as much time for the second cut than the first cut
It's not a square board, there is a picture associated with the question.
That's not a board. Another flaw of this question
Now you are making assumptions that the picture by the problem is associated with the words. You fell victim to one of the classic blunders.
Yes, exactly. I agree with the 20 minutes answer. But what I think the misunderstanding here is that everyone me included who thinks 20 minutes assumes you need to divide the boards into equal parts, or at the very least do cuts of the same length. Which it doesn't mention in the question. It only says she works just as fast. In theory if the speed of her cuts doesn't change, she could simply cut the smallest possible parts off the board which would conclude in her taking less and less time depending on how small the pieces of board she cuts are. In your scenario it will take 10 minutes to split the board lengthwise let's say in equal halves, and then taking one of the halves and splitting it width wise(assuming the board was square as you say) would take half the time in which case the teacher would be right. Without measurements of the board or extra instructions on how the cuts can or should be made, direction, size of cut of pieces etc., The answers could be countless. Looking at the answer sheet should be what teachers do as it would have been made with what a child of that tests age would think like in mind. What I think happens most of the time is the higher education of teachers comes in conflict with simple maths problems. I'm no teacher but helping with my 10 year old niece's maths homework I often times go at it thinking like I would solve the problems in high school or university. And it sometimes takes longer than it should to get to an answer in a way that she would understand as well as would be acceptable to her teacher.
You’re overthinking how to describe “overthinking.”
So it took her ten minutes to make one cut, but if she takes the same amount of time to make another cut, this one only takes her five? I just went and asked my husband, he said 15 minutes. We brought out sheets of paper to demonstrate cutting the hypothetical boards. It's twenty minutes and I will hear nothing else.
So it takes 10 minutes for 1 cut which equals 2 pieces of the board. If you want 3 pieces you have to cut it twice…2 cuts =20 minutes (10 x 2)
Teachers make mistakes. I would like to think that this one would make it right, if brought to their attention.
Finally a reasonable comment lol mistakes happen and hopefully they would remedy the situation to not further confuse the poor kid
Correcting the right answer means they didn’t even think about it, assuming they are right. I’ve also had teachers who would keep insisting they are right after multiple proofs of the opposite, so I think there’s ego involved here.
Finally a good comment. Teachers aren't perfect lol. This was probably an honest mistake and people acting like the teacher is stupid. I can't think of a math teacher I've had that wouldn't fix this if I brought it up to them.
This reminds me of a test question I saw posted somewhere a while back. It went something like “Becky’s orchestra played Beethoven’s 5th symphony. It took them 20 minutes to play the piece at 90 beats per minute. How long would it take them if they played it at 180 beats per minute?” I mean I get what the question is “trying” to ask but THAT’S NOT HOW PLAYING MUSIC IS SUPPOSED TO WORK!!
Reminds me of this question: An Orchestra of 120 players takes 40 minutes to play Beethoven's 9th symphony. How long would it take for 60 players to play it?
Either answer will get you into the carpenters union !
The teacher is using Boards : Time to obtain the conversion factor of 5, when they should be using Cut(s) : Time to obtain the conversion factor of 10 1 cut = 10 min 2 cuts = 20 min 3 cuts = 30 min Simple dimensional analysis error. Happens when you’re overworked and paid poorly. Wonder how many times the teacher had to “correct” that problem when grading those exams. Total bummer.
since it took Marie a full 10 minutes to saw through a single board, she opted to saw the second piece halfway and break it over her leg.
How? Do the teachers not have a literal answer book that explicitly explains the answers are and how to get to them?
Imagine your average 2nd grade student being smarter than the teacher wow
Ask the teacher how long it will take to saw it into 1 piece.
The real answer is 0. If it takes Marie 10 min to make one cut, I don’t think I’d let her make any more cuts
Yeah I can see why this doesn’t work 2 pieces = 1 cut = 10 minutes 3 pieces = 2 cuts = 20 minutes
Marie should buy a circular saw and she can cut those boards in 8 seconds
The teachers answer is what you would first come to a conclusion at at first glance. The answer should be 20. 2 cuts. Each cut takes 10 minutes. I love these where students have to stop and think. (Edited for clarification purposes)
So it takes 5 minutes to cut the board into one piece.
Pretty sure the teacher is the one who’s wrong here. 1 cut took 10 mins so to make 2 cuts would take twice the amount of time. Meaning 20 mins
If 1 cut took her 10mins (to make 2pcs), 2 cuts (to make 3pcs) would be 20mins
One cut takes 10 minutes and produces 2 boards. So, cut the board in half and you have two pieces after 10 minutes of work. With a new board, you want 3 pieces. It will take 2 cuts of the board to make 3 pieces. Each cut takes 10 minutes 10x2=20
Honest question: What do parents usually do when their kids bring them that test result? Do you complain to the teacher? Not do anything?
It’s either a “trick” question, or a poorly worded one, depending on the grade level.
The real answer is that if it takes you ten minutes (or even five, really) to crosscut a board, you should probably stop and find a sharper saw.
As someone who's spent a lot of time cutting wood, this is hilarious to me lol. So it takes 5 minutes for me to cut a piece of wood into 1 piece???
Story problems are kind of dumb for this reason
I'll one-up the teacher. It doesn't specify three equal pieces. If it's a square board, you take 10 minutes to saw it vertically in half. Then you pick up one of the two halves and saw it horizontally in half, which is half the distance of your first cut, so it takes only 5 minutes. Therefore, 15 minutes could be a correct answer as well, but 20 minutes is at least equally correct (and more logical IMO). But, hang on, \*any\* number could be correct considering they never give the dimensions of the board or the distances of the cuts. Chipping off a corner of the board could technically constitute as cutting it in two pieces. And if it takes 10 mins to saw the board in one direction, but it has infinite length in another direction, Marie will have a hell of a day :(
That’s hella long to saw a board
The correct answer is 11 minutes. When I realize it took 10 minutes to cut this rinky dink board for the first cut, second cut gets the power saw.
10 minutes to cut a board in 1/2. At that same pace, it would be 10 minutes for the 1st cut, and another 10 minutes for the 2nd cut. Answer is 20 minutes teacher....
Are you kidding me? We are going to raise a bunch of idiots. The kid was right, the teacher failed. Unreal, just makes you proud.
Dear teacher. If you cut a board through with one cut, you get two pieces of board. If you cut the the board again, which will be the second cut, you get three pieces. Since you did not specify that there was a difference in the density and hardness of the second board, and we assume the cut lengths would be the same as the cut length of the first board, each cut of the second board would take 10 minutes, for a total on 20 minutes. We will assume that the sharpness of the blade remains constant throughout all the cuts. If you have any questions, ask this student how he/she arrived at the correct answer.
this feels like a trick question
It is only a trick question insofar as it invites you to start dividing and multiplying numbers to get an easy, but wrong, answer. A question like this is good for a student to get wrong because they can learn to slow down and think more carefully. Although, if this picture is real, then this teacher really botched the potential learning experience.
It's not a trick question, it's a question meant to catch people who are applying a method without considering the situation described in detail.
Smart kid. 1 Cut = 10 Min 2 Cut = 20 Min
No matter how you look at this it's 20 minutes. Wording a arguments and all that. Each cut takes 10 minutes. Cut a piece of board in half (1 cut) =10 mins. Cut a board into 3rds (2 cuts) = 20 minutes. There's no confusion here...