The Game of Set

For the first evening meeting of 2020, Greg Fein led us through an exploration of the card game, Set.

The meeting began with Greg passing out a few decks of the game Set and giving time for all to explore the cards. Some of us were familiar with the game, but for others this was the first time seeing these cards. We then shared our observations of the cards in the deck.

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Skellzies!

Ramon had his students work on research projects, sharing their cultural backgrounds and relating them to mathematics. He shared the results of one student’s project and then led us into an exploration of the New York City street game called skellzies, skully caps, skellies, etc. (depending where and when you grew up in the city.)

When we walked into the room, this was on the board:

Teaching Problem: For three consecutive semesters, an adult education teacher began classes with roughly 36 students and ended with roughly 12 students. What can the teacher try that will help to reduce attrition?

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There’s More to Tic Tac Toe than You Know…

We welcomed two first time CAMI members to a meeting where we once again looked deeply at something that is so familiar, we take it for granted. Greg Fein’s exploration helped us to unpack tic-tac-toe and find the math. It turns out is an ancient game with roots all over the world, with perhaps something innately human at the heart of it.

Launch

Greg started by putting a familiar drawing on the board and asked us what came to mind:

We responded with “tic-tac-toe, hashtag, 9 squares, right angles. parallel lines…”

Greg then focused us on our first impression and asked us to remember the rules of tic-tac-toe:

  1. X goes first in one of 9 spaces.
  2. Then O chooses a space.
  3. X and O alternate turns.
  4. The game ends when there are 3 X’s or 3 O’s in a row or when all the spaces are filled.
  5. If all the spaces are filled and there are not 3 X’s or O’s in a row, then the game is a draw.

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