Number Sense Blog



Holy Moley! October 23 is National Mole Day!

Oct 23, 2015

It’s a big day for chemistry (and math!) enthusiasts—October 23 is National Mole Day! Before images of burrowing, subterranean rodents with limited vision come to mind, allow us to offer a brief explanation of this very big number. In chemistry...



Mathing During the Holidays: A More Economical Way to Wrap Presents

Dec 14, 2015

(Image source) FACT: math is everywhere... and it comes in pretty handy during the holidays! Case in point: this awesome video featuring British mathematician Sarah Santos' math formula for wrapping presents! Sarah's formula (at about 3:14—pi m...



Legos: An Excellent Math Manipulative

Dec 15, 2015

(Image source) At Mathnasium, we're all about making math make sense to kids. That said, bringing out manipulatives—physical objects used as teaching tools—in appropriate situations is a fantastic way to render abstract math concepts concrete! ...



The Future is Here: SpaceX Rocket Launch a Game Changer For Space Exploration

Dec 22, 2015

Just in time for the holidays, here’s a history-making STEM comeback story we can all get behind! After a failed rocket launch in June that ended in an explosion, space technology company SpaceX successfully sent an unmanned Falcon 9 rocket into s...



Math and the Holidays: Recipes, Ratio, and Proportion

Dec 23, 2015

What’s your favorite holiday dish? From fruitcake to latkes, whatever it is, it’s most likely made by following step-by-step instructions and fixed quantities of ingredients listed in a recipe! The relationship between ingredients in a recipe c...



Four New Elements Added to the Periodic Table!

Jan 8, 2016

As the world closed the books on 2015 and said hello to 2016, the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry dropped some big news for chemists/chemistry enthusiasts and the world of STEM in general! On December 30, they announced the addit...



Kepler: The (Broken) Space Telescope That Could

Jan 12, 2016

Between last December's epic SpaceX rocket launch and the recent unveiling of four new elements on the periodic table, the last couple of months have been huge for the world of STEM! Last week, the American Astronomical Society announced that the ...



STEM Career Spotlight: Alyssa Frazee, Machine Learning Engineer

Jan 19, 2016

Every day, Machine Learning Engineer Alyssa Frazee uses math to fight crime... and we have to admit, her job title sounds pretty cool, too! In the second installment of our STEM Career Spotlight, learn how talented professionals like Alyssa create...



Venus Fly Traps... and Math?

Jan 22, 2016

(Image: "venus fly trap" by Peter Shanks is licensed under CC BY 2.0) We have to admit, we thought we were dreaming when we came across the headline Venus Fly Traps Use Counting To Identify Prey. Turns out, counting is the key to this carnivoro...



STEM Career Spotlight: Lauren Schreibstein, Healthcare Analytics Manager

Jan 25, 2016

Once an aspiring doctor, Healthcare Analytics Manager Lauren Schreibstein found her professional niche using math and data analysis to help keep New Yorkers healthy. The most populous city in the United States is much a healthier one thanks to thi...



Math and the Weather

Jan 28, 2016

Have you ever wanted to use math to predict the future? To an extent, that’s exactly what meteorologists do when they forecast the weather—including the arrival of Winter Storm Jonas, which blanketed most of the east coast last weekend. Ima...



Happy Leap Day!

Feb 29, 2016

2016 is a leap year, and February, the shortest month of the year, gains an extra day—February 29th, otherwise known as leap day! So why do we have leap years and days? Leap years and days are adjustments built into the calendar’s structure to ...



Math in Nature: A Prime Life Cycle for Periodical Cicadas!

Apr 22, 2016

We’re always tickled to see unusual instances of math in nature, and this headline certainly had us grinning from ear to ear: Periodic Cicadas are Coming: Mathematical Bugs in the Prime of their Lives! While many 17-year-old humans spend springtim...



NASA Announces 1,284 New Planets!

May 16, 2016

Image: NASA/W. Stenzel Our favorite space telescope has made headlines once again! On Tuesday, NASA announced the verification of 1,284 new planets discovered by the Kepler mission. It’s the single largest planet discovery to date. Kepler pi...



Math Fun: How Much Do You Weigh on Other Planets?

Jun 7, 2016

Have you ever wondered why astronauts can jump so high on the moon? It’s because the force of gravity on the moon is lower than it is on Earth! Simply put, gravity is the force that attracts two objects to each other. On a larger scale, our ...


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