During COVID-19 isolation, Dr. Jennifer Austin and her seven-year-old daughter Zoe co-authored the short story Math Girl Solves the Pattern. Here we meet the superheroine Math Girl and her nemesis Minus Girl. Math Girl is observant, curious, and creative. Houses, balls, and sailboats are disappearing! The mystery must be solved. Persevering Math Girl saves the day

Austin, Jennifer K.M.

Austin, Zoe H

English

Scholarship@Claremont

Journal of Humanistic Mathematics Volume 11 | Issue 2 July 2021 Math Girl Solves the Pattern Zoe H. Austin Headwaters School Jennifer K.M. Austin The University of Texas at Austin Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm  Part of the Arts and Humanities Commons, and the Mathematics Commons Recommended Citation Austin, Z. H. and Austin, J. K. "Math Girl Solves the Pattern," Journal of Humanistic Mathematics, Volume 11 Issue 2 (July 2021), pages 298-300. . Available at: https://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm/vol11/iss2/16 ©2021 by the authors. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License. JHM is an open access bi-annual journal sponsored by the Claremont Center for the Mathematical Sciences and published by the Claremont Colleges Library | ISSN 2159-8118 | http://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm/ The editorial staff of JHM works hard to make sure the scholarship disseminated in JHM is accurate and upholds professional ethical guidelines. However the views and opinions expressed in each published manuscript belong exclusively to the individual contributor(s). The publisher and the editors do not endorse or accept responsibility for them. See https://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm/policies.html for more information. Math Girl Solves the PatternZoe H. AustinHeadwaters School, Austin, Texas, USAzoehope.austin@gmail.comJennifer K. M. AustinDepartment of Mathematics, The University of Texas at Austin, USAjmann@math.utexas.eduSynopsisDuring COVID-19 isolation, Dr. Jennifer Austin and her seven-year-old daughterZoe co-authored the short story “Math Girl Solves the Pattern”. Here we meetthe superheroine Math Girl and her nemesis Minus Girl. Math Girl is observant,curious, and creative. Houses, balls, and sailboats are disappearing! The mysterymust be solved. Persevering Math Girl saves the day.Keywords: mathsuperhero, pattern, Fibonacci, mathgirl.A long time ago there was a girl named Math Girl. She was a superhero toeveryone. She saved everyone with her superpower — math!One day she met her enemy — Minus Girl. Minus always made terrible mathjokes about subtraction. She could take away anything with her subtractionpower.Houses by houses and sailboats by sailboats would disappear.Math Girl was the only one who could help. She had to find out Minus’pattern.A pattern is something that repeats itself over and over.Once Math Girl found out Minus’ pattern, she could stop Minus from strikingagain.Journal of Humanistic Mathematics Volume 11 Number 2 (July 2021)Zoe H. Austin and Jennifer K. M. Austin 299Math Girl thought the pattern went yellow, green, blue, blue, red, red, andred.One yellow house, one green house, two blue balls, and three red sailboatsdisappeared in a flash.Oh no! Math Girl was wrong. When Math Girl went to a yellow house,Minus was not there! Minus was at the crystal cave. Math Girl was confused.Luckily Minus only took five crystals before she was caught. Then Math Girlthought and thought. Math Girl thought it must be a number pattern. Itmust go 1, 1, 2, 3, 5! Math Girl was right! When Minus struck again, Minustook eight people. Aha, Math Girl’s sequence would continue 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8,...., which is the Fibonacci sequence.Math Girl caught Minus. Math Girl saved the day! The end.This short story is an example of how first-grader Zoe Austin and her mom,Jennifer Austin, spent part of their time during the COVID-19 pandemic.Zoe has heard her mom share about searching for patterns and about the Fi-bonacci sequence in particular as part of various online courses and outreachevents. Zoe is very observant, creative, and imaginative. She regularly enter-tains her family with songs and stories that she writes. She worked togetherwith her mom to compose this short story.Reflective Commentary by Zoe Austin:“This is supposed to teach kids about math.”“If this were a movie, Minus’ hair would be purple.”“Math Girl’s powers are not just math. She can shoot out plus and minussigns out of her hands.”Author bios:Zoe Hope Austin is a first-grade student at Headwaters School in Austin, TX, whereshe lives with her parents, two dogs, one cat, one rabbit, a tank of fish, and one owlwho inhabits a backyard owl house. Zoe is curious, creative, observant, articulate, andimaginative as she voraciously takes on the world around her. Zoe is developing hermathematical skills in numeracy, geometry, data analysis, and financial literacy. Zoeis active in her Girl Scout Troop 11235 where she has earned badges in STEM careerexploration, robotics, citizen science, coding, and space science.300 Math Girl Solves the PatternJennifer K. Mann Austin, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor of Instruction and Undergrad-uate Mathematics Faculty Advisor at the University of Texas at Austin. Dr. Austin chairsthe Mathematics Undergraduate Studies Committee and the Mathematics College Readi-ness Committee and serves on various departmental, college, and university committeesfocused on undergraduate education. She helped establish and is now the faculty sponsorfor the UT Austin Student Chapter of the Association of Women in Mathematics. Ful-filling her passion for outreach, Dr. Austin co-organizes the Mathematics Teachers’ Circleof Austin, volunteers for CNS Admissions events, CNS Family Day, and Explore UT, andleads Girl Scout Troop 11235. Dr. Austin’s interests include undergraduate mathemat-ics education, mathematical outreach, active learning, topology, knot theory, biomedicalapplications of mathematics, and DNA topology.

Math Girl Solves the Pattern

https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1883&context=jhm

Math Girl Solves the Pattern

Abstract

Similar works

Full text

Available Versions

Scholarship@Claremont