Links for 2010-06-09

“Let’s say you want to prove that all the dominoes are going to fall. One way to do this would be to prove that the fall of one causes the fall of the next, and that the first domino falls. Those two statements combined prove that all the dominoes will fall.

Mathematical induction works much the same way.”

“Audubon has sent me to lots of wild places over the past 31 years, but I’d seen only one wolf and three cougars (a litter) until December 8, 2009. On that day, before noon in the Glacier National Park ecosystem of northwestern Montana, I encountered not just one wolf but two and not just one cougar but two! What were the chances of that?

Well, they were 100 percent, because I’d rented the animals for a photo shoot.”

“Although I know I’m tempting the speech-code-police to come after me, I’ll admit that if I were king of higher ed for a day, I’d ban the phrase “get your gen eds out of the way.”

It’s one of those phrases that well-meaning advisors use to try to help students plan their schedules. But I’m convinced it does untold damage.”

“I think I may have somewhat of a compromise when it comes to assessing student written work. I was in the same situation as many writing instructors for years. Students write, write, write. Then I would spend about five minutes per page supplying written commentary individually on each of their papers. But about a year ago I started doing things differently. And I don’t plan on going back any time soon.”