1512 Post #2: Same Difference

I really started to hit a rhythm with homework at the end of last week. I was cruising through my review of mean, median, and mode when I couldn't for the life of me identify what it was about math I did not understand in high school. Then it hit me. I should I say I hit it. Standard deviation. I had to put that in bold colors because that is how I saw it when I came to that section. I had totally forgotten all about this procedure for math.

Just today I was trying to think of a name for this post title. I wanted to get a clear cut definition of the word deviate. Mirriam Webster dictionary classifies deviant as the action of going against rules, principles, or standards. I immediately started to think about how much I hate it when people say "same difference". No it is not the same, there is a difference. Unless I have three apples and either you or Carl eats one (I don't care who really eats my apple) I still have two apples no matter who ate the third. In that case, sure I'll accept same difference, but often times people use it in situations that do not warrant that phrase.

Back to the idea of standard deviation in terms of math. I was cruising along working on homework problems figuring out the mean, subtracting the mean from each number on my list, squaring the result, adding those squares, dividing by the number of data elements on the list, and then finding the square root of that answer to get the standard deviation. It was then that I realized that I don't hate standard deviation as much as I hate my calculator. For some reason, it was rounding to the nearest hundredth place when I was trying to complete that last part of the problem. I now have a new calculator that I am sure will do the trick if I could figure out how to work it.

I was able to find a really cool website that has different avenues for student help dealing with standard deviation. Math is Fun does appear to be geared toward a middle/high school. There are games, puzzles, worksheets, lesson plan ideas, and differentiated explanations to concepts that all teachers could find useful. While it is a matter of memorizing the route to get to the desired location with standard deviation; we must also remember to explain the reasoning. This is not a time where we should use "same difference" between the students learning the meaning of the work or memorizing the steps without cognitive thought.