Animal variables
December 23, 2007 pm31 8:34 pm
From left to right, elephant, sea monster, frog, grass, vortex. I don’t know why my algebra students call the middle one “frog,” but it doesn’t much matter. I get squeals when I throw one of these into a problem set.
The elephant was originally oriented to the left, but then the exponents looked like floppy ears, so we had to switch. My breaking the middle on the right is a bit sloppy, but since it involves sea monsters, that shouldn’t be a problem.
Friday, a bunch of kids exchanged elephant or frog socks… And when I come back from Scotland with Nessie chachkas…
JD2718 
Cool–I must have missed this post earlier. I must start using elephants as variables…
Elephants — they’re the new x’s! :-)
In a lesson on exponential and logarithmic functions today, I used “elephant” and “vortex” as variables in Algebra 2. I got squeals! You’re a genius! Thank you! :)
– Elizabeth (aka @cheesemonkeysf on Twitter)
thank you for telling me!
The grade I developed these with as freshmen, I now have most as seniors. I think we need to ride the elephants to graduation… : )
This is just so awesomely creative! Your students are very lucky!