Quick: What is an imaginary number?

Oh, sure, you could cheat and use Wikipedia, or--even better--Simple Wikipedia. But do you recall the definition of an imaginary number from your Algebra class (or, at least, Calvin and Hobbes)?

An imaginary number is the square root of a negative number (which, since a negative number times a negative number is always positive, is impossible). But imaginary numbers are very helpful when you're solving for an equation and you find you need to get the square root of both sides of an equation and one of them happens to be negative:

Solve for x:
x² = -72

If you're still reading, I guess you either find math fascinating--as I do--or you trust me to get to some kind of point worth suffering through the horror of math. Or, you've been skimming and not really paying attention.

If you're no longer reading, I'm glad you at least stopped by. <smile>

I must admit that I still get a little woozy and sick to my stomach when someone asks me how many purple beads are in the pile if 3/4 of them are red, 25% of the rest are black, 14 are white, and x orange beads were given to Bobby last Saturday when Susie took 1/18 of the total for a lemonade stand where she sells a glass of juice from concentrate for $4.13, and ice is another 7% if you want it on Thursdays.

Cherish has a very interesting post on our aversion to math which is often linked to school teachers.
[Edit: Sorry, I forgot to add my "mild profanity" disclaimer.]

I'm not sure if my dad helped give me an interest in math by insisting that he show why 34-17=17; I certainly didn't appreciate it at the time because I just wanted the answer. But his patient--and infuriating--demonstrations of how math really makes sense have helped me.

I hope I can do the same for my children with a few less tears.

Hmm... I guess today was a Math Monday.

 ~Luke Holzmann
Filmmaker, Writer, Expectant Father

First, a couple funny images:

I read blogs via Google Reader, and use hotkeys to get through the posts faster. But sometimes my fingers hit the wrong keys and I start typing instead. This is what I looked up to see this morning:

NOM link here

And, for as smooth as everything went yesterday, there were a few minutes where Sonlight's homepage looked like this:

10am MST April 1, 2009

Now that we've had our giggles, time to move on to the second--and real--point of this post:

I read yesterday that online communities must be small because "[t]rue community only thrives when the members deeply care for one another." There are many other fascinating points, and so I suggest you read the whole thing.

It got me thinking, though. Granted, I'm not close to all the bloggers I read, but I'd like to think that I have already established very close connection to at least a couple of my "bloggy friends." And considering I attended the wedding of a friend I met via World of Warcraft, and more and more people are meeting their soulmate online, I think this online community has brought us to a very real dimension of connection... even if it isn't IRL.

The Sonlight Forums are a prime example of a rather large online community. And maybe this community thrives on the deep care each member has for homeschooling rather than each other. And so like many other clubs and gatherings, an online community is built around focus, purpose, or interest.

Churches come to mind.

As much as I should deeply care about all of my brothers and sisters in Christ, there's no way I could. But I still gather with them every week in church. And we have community. I have a much closer community with my small groups and friends, but there is community with the other members of my church.

Or, perhaps, I'm just a child of this digital age, and so can't remember the "good old days" when people really did have communities.

So, what do you think, friends?

 ~Luke Holzmann
Filmmaker, Writer, Expectant Father

Again and again blog posts pop up that suggest public schools need to "stick to the basics" of reading, writing and arithmetic and not waste so much time on other things that have little or nothing to do with education. These kinds of posts tend to make it into my Other Posts of Note.

And today I came across a post about students taught to Twitter in school. It sounds like it's part of a "social media 101" course, or something.

My thought is this: Perhaps educators have realized that life makes for a great classroom and there is much to be learned in this great wide world of daily living, and so they must get involved in helping their students grow in all aspects of life.

Which would be great if they could get through the lessons they are supposed to be teaching in four hours a day so they could spend the rest of the time experiencing the joy of life-long learning with their students.

But they can't.

So in trying to help kids succeed in all areas of life, they end up with only 36% of their students proficient in the basics (like my local public school).

In trying to teach kids to tweet, they fail to teach children to write.

Thankfully, as a homeschooler, you have the opportunity to get through your "required" lessons quickly, and if you want to turn your child's blog and Twitter account into "Social Media 101" for credit... you can.

Homeschooling: Making the most of the classroom of life.

Sounds like a nice tagline.

 ~Luke Holzmann
Filmmaker, Writer, Expectant Father

As one of the "web guys" here at Sonlight, I have to keep an eye on Search Engine Optimization (SEO). We want people to be able to find our site if they search for "homeschool curriculum" and "curriculum packages" and "Christian homeschooling" ... you get the picture. And so, we try to make sure our pages contain those words so Googlebot can help others find our incredible homeschool materials and support.

Aside: yes, Sonlight's curriculum is really, really good. Sonlight is not for everyone, sure, but if it is a fit for you and your family, it is the best. Not that I'm biased or anything <smile>.

I also try to keep an eye on what others are saying about Sonlight out here on the intertubes. And I keep running into these sites that seem to have taken SEO to a whole new level of insanity. For example, I came across the following blog post today:

Sonlight Curriculum Vendor of total homeschool package

Looks potentially useful. What does it have to say? Near as I can tell, the first bit is about Sonlight, and the rest is not. And even the bit about Sonlight is almost unintelligible:

NotesResources are ranked within each topic the first listed is the useful and the last the least useful, in my opinion. Also offers lots of info on and resources for homeschooling. Catalog downloadable updates for users

Huh?

I poked around the site a little more and discovered that many of the posts appear to be nothing more than textual vomit--that was for you, Melonie <smile>--trying to pass for SEO.

If you find that I ever start doing something that works for machines but is meaningless to you, please ask me to stop.

Thank you.

 ~Luke Holzmann
Filmmaker, Writer, Expectant Father

Stereotypes abound.

They are a fact of life, and, in some ways, vital to our ability to function. Without stereotypes we would be forced to experience everything as brand new, completely unique, and utterly foreign. Every encounter would be a jumble of questions and discovery that would leave us exhausted at the end of the day.

"Will that two-year-old speak to me as an informed adult, or in gibberish?"

"Does the girl ringing up my purchase want a hug, or should I just smile?"

"Does that kid on the skateboard with piercings all over want to be engaged in a conversation about Calculus, or should I keep things 'chill' instead?"

Granted, the child may be eloquent, the girl may actually like hugs, and the skater boy may be very adept at Calculus. In fact, there's even a wildly popular TV show based around building up stereotypes and then taking them apart.

And so, while very useful--and the foundation of quite a bit of comedy--stereotypes aren't always accurate or helpful.

There are many of these less than ideal stereotypes surrounding homeschoolers... and Christians... and as a Christian who was homeschooled and then went off to a Christian University, sometimes I wonder how many of those stereotypes are closer to reality than would be ideal. And how much of a positive impact do I have on others, especially since I know my own foibles and failures all too well? How much real, positive change has my life had because of who I am, what I believe, and what I've been through?

Today I read about a book that seems to provide some interesting insight into the Christian side of things (sorry, it's not really about homeschooling at all). This book is written by a young man raised in a liberal secular home who decided to spend a semester at Liberty University. The review is fascinating enough, but I'm guessing the book will really open our eyes.

Rosslyn Elliott

May all of us--Christian, atheist, homeschooled, public school teacher, or otherwise--learn that we may be wrong about our assumptions and our stereotypes may be off. And may we all embody the good aspects of our particular groups' stereotypes in a way that inspires love and good-will.

 ~Luke Holzmann
Filmmaker, Writer, Expectant Father

Last night was a big night: We finished off one tube of toothpaste and started on another one. ...which my wife promptly squeezed from the center of the tube.

Not that I'm bitter or anything.

The fact that she clearly refuses to correctly use the toothpaste tube doesn't cause that much marital strife.

Really.

Proper Toothpaste Usage

...where was I?

Ah yes.

As I walked to the recycle bin to dispose of the box in an environmentally friendly way, I felt a rather strong desire to keep the box just in case. 'Just think of all the things you could do with that box,' my inner child said to me.

'Like what?' I queried.

My inner child couldn't think of anything precisely, and so the box went into the recycle bin. But as I walked back toward the bathroom--where my wife was mutilating the shiny new tube of paste--I realized that something had just died a little more within me: The belief that raw materials are worth something simply because of the potential they contain; raw materials wait for our creativity to bring them to life and give them purpose.

I still get giddy about a 1'x2' bit of 1/4" flooring rubber, but I no longer keep Mac & Cheese boxes to turn them into burning buildings for a video (unfortunately, my mom caught me heading out the door armed with paper, a box, and matches before I was able to create that scene). I think I've lost something about creative thinking and natural wonder, and I hope I get it back when I'm finally a dad. I remember all the time I had as a homeschooled child that let me create cell phones from plywood and used cap gun caps, rocket ships from bicycle pumps, and castles from toilet paper tubes. A shoe box used to be the perfect foundation for... well... something.

And I've lost much of that, but I think I will need to get it back. For now, I must live vicariously through all of you. What crazy creative things have your children recently done with the "junk"/"treasures" around your house lately?

 ~Luke Holzmann
Filmmaker, Writer, Expectant Father