Frazz by Jef Mallett for March 29, 2013

Hope it wasn’t the erasure end, because he may need that later…..That being said, I have no Idea what this is about….

It is 3.

25 to 8 is 3. 1 is added to 5, which makes it 15.

My favorite strips always include Caufield and Mrs. Olsen; boo hiss on the bashers of intellect!

I can’t wait until Caulfield gets to imaginary numbers.

If they were learning Precalculus, they would know that ALL real numbers are complex (3 +0*i). For any math nerds out there…

It’s like I tell my students, simple/complex does not always equate to easy/difficult. Something can be very complex but not be difficult if the steps involved are rote.

“255 ÷ 85 is not complex.”

But 255 + 85i is.

Not that it matters.

“For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.” —H. L. Mencken

2+5+5=12 with is divisible by 3, thus 255 is divisible by 3

e to the i times pi is a complex problem, but the answer is simply -1,

Here’s another perspective on Caulfield’s comment about Eli. I like Ewal Doh’ s theory, above, that Eli is determined to work the problem in his head, recording only the answer. He doesn’t want to “show his work,” as kids are generally asked to do so that the teacher can see (visually) whether or not the child actually understands the process. In one of Laura Ingalls Wilders’ “Little House” books, Laura is fifteen or sixteen, and graduating from the tiny little school in her pioneer community. The whole town assembles for the event, which consists of nothing but recitation. Laura must recite the history of the U.S., including all presidents, battles, dates, and so forth, and she must mentally and verbally work a long-division problem involving quite a significant number of digits. In those days, students were preparing for careers that involved working out pretty much everything mentally; they’d go on to be storekeepers, farmers, carpenters, and – like laura, the following year – teachers. They didn’t have a lot of paper and pencils, and nary an adding machine or a calculator, so they learned to do mentally the “complex” arithmetic they’d need in order to be successful in life. For Eli, the long-division problem Mrs. Olsen gave them might well have seemed eraser-chewingly complex simply because he was working it out mentally, which is much more demanding than working it out on paper. It is for me, anyway, and I actually enjoy doing it!

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If I’m reading it right, Eli has worked the probelm, but Caulfied has not. Apparently, he’s just been monitoring Eli’s progress!

@water_moon

Echoing bigpuma, thanks for your comment. I had similar issues (broad vocabulary, resources at home that made me seem like a know-it-all in school, etc.) and as an adult came to the conclusion that it’s every bit as hard to be a child at the top of the scale as to struggle at the bottom; it’s just different. Those who blurt do provide stimulation for the others, and an example of what’s possible. They can be leaders in that sense, even though they seem obnoxious. With good support, they can learn sensitivity, grace, and appropriateness, which makes for good citizenship in high school, college, and adulthood. Caulfield will eventually find himself in classes with other gifted kids, and they will all rub off each other’s corners, so to speak. Seems to me Frazz is trying to bridge the spaces between all these points of view.

One of my favorite things about this strip and the comments here is how much I learn. Despite my self-touted vocabulary, I never knew the word “autodidact” until I got here. I’ve learned more than I would have thought possible about cashews. And today I discovered imaginary numbers. (Should they have been covered in my freshman calculus class? Were they, in fact, covered on a day I was elsewhere? I may never know….)