Classroom candy

Why are these students stacking candy hearts? What possible educational purpose can that serve?
Probably none, but they are having fun. This student will never get all of those hearts in one stack.
This will work a lot better. Stacking candy seemed to amused them.
The candy itself was left over from Valentine's Day and was used in a previous class to illustrate confidence intervals. We were trying to estimate the average number of candy hearts in the individual bags. The sample itself was not a random sample--they came from a couple of big bags of little bags from a local store that had discounted them to get rid of them. So the results may not be valid, but the point was to show in a sweet, non-abstract way how a procedure worked. Each student got a couple of bags to count, and then we entered the results into a spread sheet. Using the sample mean, the standard error, and a t-value obtained from a t-value calculator, we got an interval estimate, an estimate that involved hearing, sight, touch, taste, and maybe even smell.

With a sample of 30 bags, we had a mean of 18.7 and a standard deviation of 2.053592311. This implies a standard error of 0.374932944. We know that if we take another sample of 30 bags, we will probably not get the same as as we got the first time. Each time we take a sample, we will almost always be a bit too big or a bit too small. The standard error is an estimate of how much we will be off on average. Using that, we can construct an interval in a way so that 95% of the time when we construct this interval, we will get the true mean. For this example, we would be 95% confident in the interval 17.9 to 19.5. We cannot tell if the average per bag is 18 or 19, but we are pretty sure it is not 17 or 20.

Except that one student spilled his candy on the floor. He picked it up and counted it, but another student may have added some bits to his pile. He got 26, which was the highest of any student. If we include his bag, we change our interval to 18.1 to 19.8. But should we count it?

I hope this 100-cents, five-sense experience made sense to them.

Jenna brought cookies

What should a student do who gets cookies from home? The answer is obvious. She should bring them to class and share them with the other students.
Even if they are a scruffy bunch.

What is so happy about birthdays?

I enjoyed some Happy-29th-Birthday cake on Friday. Even more I enjoyed asking the person having the birthday, "What it is like getting to be so old? What should I be watching out for when I get to be as old as you are?"
Happy birthday to the good Karen!

They are all gone now

Before Christmas the baking begins. Dozens and dozens of delicious Christmas cookies come out of the oven. But they are not to be eaten under pain of death or something almost as awful, at least not until December 25, when the feasting begins. Then they go to friends and family.
They were very good. Both Dessert Survivor and Desert Survivor enjoyed them, though neither had anything to do with their creation. And now Dessert Survivor has miles and miles to run to undo the weight gain that they caused.

My Favorite Christmas Cookies

I love cookies, and to me, Christmas is the ultimate time to eat cookies. There are so many good recipes to try. I didn't have a lot of time this year, but I probably made seven or eight different kinds of cookies, and these are some of my favorite. The bars in the middle are Seven Layer bars. I didn't have butterscotch chips so I used dried cranberries, and they were great. The cookies around the edge are almond-raspberry shortbread thumbprints. These have been a hit every year, and I can't stop eating them. The ingredients are simple: butter, sugar, flour, almond extract, and seedless raspberry jam. Yum, yum, yum.

Cookie cutouts have been a tradition at Christmas. I didn't have any helpers for decorating, so the cookies look rather plain this year. I like the strange ways kids decorate cookies! Nevertheless, they tasted great, and alas, disappeared all too fast.

Holiday cookies and desserts

The Christmas season brings with it many parties, concerts, open houses, and various special events that have cookies and other desserts. This year I decided to keep track of all the cookies that they offered. (If you have a blog that needs pictures of desserts, and you do not have the talent to make them, you do whatever is necessary.)

The first was a sale at the college bookstore. The little cookies were bait to attract shoppers, who then were expected to buy something that was on sale.
I attended a community event called Santa's Village, meant mostly for kids, that had cookies.

I skipped a December graduation event because it was too late in the day, but I suspect it had cookies. However, I did attend a band concert with big cookies.
Some Christmas events are by invitation only. Here are desserts at a very nice invitation-only Christmas party I went to.
Wait, there was more. The little men were solid chocolate! I am not sure what the little white snowmen were made of--I did not try one, but I am sure they were delicious.
One of the local banks had a customer appreciation day or some excuse to serve big bakery cookies. I would like to make an Alliance with them--they provide cookies, and I will eat them.
And finally, there is the employee Christmas party with cheesecake.
That is enough for one post. If I find more cookies, I will show them in another post.

The two Lindas serve dessert

On the first day of finals week I was surprised by an array of cookies, cake, candy, cider, and even healthy things like grapes in the lounge. The two Lindas had been at work.
Here the new Linda is preparing brownies for the table.
Here the old Linda (can I say that?) is sampling some of the cake.
Thanks, Lindas.