Conjectures pertaining to repeated partitioning of a triangle

This note describes two conjectures pertaining to repeated partitioning of an arbitrary triangle. The first conjecture turns out to be true, and hence gives rise to a new, more general, conjecture that is also addressed in this article. Both conjectures can be explored in a dynamic geometry environment. The proofs to the conjectures addressed in this article require knowledge of high school Euclidean geometry.     

Some useful integer arrays for the teaching of generalization skills

Teachers of first-year college mathematics and engineering courses must often spend considerable time reviewing material originally taught in high school. Instead of this being a mere exercise in repetition, this article suggests that such a review can enrich and revitalize by unifying some of the subjects that need to be re-taught. In the example presented, the subjects in question are absolute values, graphs and solutions of equations, and domains of definition. These are unified by the problem of finding an analytic expression for a square and triangle and their interiors. In the course of the development, basic notions such as the additive property of areas and convexity are introduced. The approach presented in the article was tried with secondary school teachers participating in professional development workshops and with students at a technical college; the teachers and students responded enthusiastically to the material.     

On problematic aspects in learning trigonometry

In this paper, research on some problematic aspects high school students have in learning trigonometry is presented. It is based on making sense of mathematics through perception, operation and reason in the case of trigonometry. We analyzed students' understanding of trigonometric concepts in the frame of triangle and circle trigonometry contexts, as well as the transition between these two contexts. In the conclusion, we present some new problematic aspects we noticed.

The research was carried out with two groups of high school students, one of them at the beginning of their trigonometry learning (17 years old) and the other at the end of their high school education (19 years old). The students were given a questionnaire similar to that of Chin and Tall, and we analyzed the students' response. In our research, we noticed that students have difficulties with properties of periodicity and the fact that trigonometric functions are not one-to-one. In addition, there is poor understanding of radian measure and a lack of its connection to the unit circle.     

Mediated action in teachers’ discussions about mathematics tasks

This paper presents analyses of teachers?? discussions within mathematics teaching developmental research projects, taking mediation as the central construct. The relations in the so-called ??didactic triangle?? form the basic framework for the analysis of two episodes in which upper secondary school teachers discuss and prepare tasks for classroom use. The analysis leads to the suggestion that the focus on tasks places an emphasis on the task as object and its resolution as goal; mathematics has the role of a mediating artefact. Subject content in the didactic triangle is thus displaced by the task and learning mathematics may be relegated to a subordinate position.     

Learning to teach high school mathematics: Patterns of growth in understanding right triangle trigonometry during lesson plan study

“Lesson plan study” (LPS), adapted from the Japanese Lesson Study method of professional development, is a sequence of activities designed to engage prospective teachers in broadening and deepening their understanding of school mathematics and teaching strategies. LPS occurs over 5 weeks on the same lesson topic and includes four opportunities to revisit one's own ideas and the ideas of others. In this paper, we describe one prospective teacher's growth in understanding right triangle trigonometry as she participated in LPS. This study is part of a much larger study investigating how prospective secondary teachers learn to teach mathematics within the context of LPS. Results of this study indicate that Image Saying, an activity for growth in understanding from the Pirie-Kieren model [Pirie, S., & Kieren, T. (1994). Growth in mathematical understanding: How can we characterize it and how can we represent it? Educational Studies in Mathematics, 26, 165-190], is critical to prospective teachers’ growth in understanding school mathematics. Multiple opportunities and contexts within which to share understanding of school mathematics led to significant growth in understanding of right triangle trigonometry which in turn led to growth in understanding of teaching strategies. That is, the results of this study indicate that growth in understanding school mathematics (what to teach) leads to growth in understanding teaching strategies (how to teach) as prospective teachers participate in LPS.     

On teaching extrema triangle problems using dynamic investigation

An important and interesting area in the study of triangle geometry is the related issue of extrema problems and inequalities. These problems play a significant role in the mathematics study program in high school. In tasks such as these, the difficulty level is high when one does not know in advance what the expected answer is. When one knows what to prove, the difficulty level is lower and most of the effort is aimed at attaining a proof of the expected answer. This can be done using dynamic geometric software. The possibility of making frequent changes to the geometric objects and the ability of dragging objects, contributes to the process of deducing properties, checking hypotheses and generalizing. In this paper, eight investigative tasks in Euclidean geometry are presented together with the applets developed for carrying out the dynamic investigation. Some of the tasks are well known, while others are almost unknown and are worthy of presentation as enrichment for those interested in the subject. The tasks were given to preservice teachers of mathematics as part of an advanced course for integrating technological tools in the teaching of mathematics.     

Constructibility Classes for Triangle Location Problems

Straightedge-and-compass construction problems are well known for different reasons. One of them is the difficulty to prove that a problem is not constructible: it took about two millennia to prove that it is not possible in general to cut an angle into three equal parts by using only straightedge and compass. Today, such proofs rely on algebraic tools difficult to apprehend by high school student. On the other hand, the technique of problem reduction is often used in theory of computation to prove other kinds of impossibility. In this paper, we adapt the notion of reduction to geometric constructions in order to have geometric proofs for unconstructibility based on a set of problems known to be unconstructible. Geometric reductions can also be used with constructible problems: in this case, besides having constructibility, the reduction also yields a construction. To make the things concrete, we focus this study to a corpus of triangle location problems proposed by William Wernick in the eighties.     

Triangles III: Complex triangle functions

Summary This paper is the third in a series of three examining Euclidean triangle geometry via complex cross ratios. In the first two papers, we looked at triangle shapes and triangle coordinates. In this paper, we look at the triangle coordinates of the special points of a triangle, and show that they are functions of its shape. We then show how these functions can be used to prove theorems about triangles, and to gain some insight into what makes a special point of a triangle a centre.     

Membrane triangles with corner drilling freedoms— III. Implementation and performance evaluation

This paper completes a three-part series on the formulation of 3-node, 9-dof membrane triangles with corner drilling freedoms based on parametrized variational principles. The first four sections cover element implementation details including determination of optimal parameters and treatment of distributed loads. Then three elements of this type, labeled ALL, FF and EFF-ANDES, are tested on standard plane stress problems. ALL represents numerically integrated versions of Allman's 1988 triangle; FF is based on the free formulation triangle presented by Bergan and Felippa in 1985; and EFF-ANDES represent two different formulations of the optimal triangle derived in Parts I and II. The numerical studies indicate that the ALL, FF and EFF-ANDES elements are comparable in accuracy for elements of unitary aspect ratios. The ALL elements are found to stiffen rapidly in inplane bending for high aspect ratios, whereas the FF and EFF elements maintain accuracy. The EFF and ANDES implementations have a moderate edge in formation speed over the FF.     

A Lobatto interpolation grid over the triangle

^** Email: m.blyth{at}uea.ac.uk^*** Email: cpozrikidis{at}ucsd.edu A sequence of increasingly refined interpolation grids overthe triangle is proposed, with the goal of achieving uniformconvergence and ensuring high interpolation accuracy. The numberof interpolation nodes, N, corresponds to a complete mth-orderpolynomial expansion with respect to the triangle barycentriccoordinates, which arises by the horizontal truncation of thePascal triangle. The proposed grid is generated by deployingLobatto interpolation nodes along the three edges of the triangle,and then computing interior nodes by averaged intersectionsto achieve three-fold rotational symmetry. Numerical computationsshow that the Lebesgue constant and interpolation accuracy ofthe proposed grid compares favorably with those of the best-knowngrids consisting of the Fekete points. Integration weights correspondingto the set of Lobatto triangle base points are tabulated.     

A generalized Malfatti problem

Malfatti?s problem, first published in 1803, is commonly understood to ask fitting three circles into a given triangle such that they are tangent to each other, externally, and such that each circle is tangent to a pair of the triangle?s sides. There are many solutions based on geometric constructions, as well as generalizations in which the triangle sides are assumed to be circle arcs. A generalization that asks to fit six circles into the triangle, tangent to each other and to the triangle sides, has been considered a good example of a problem that requires sophisticated numerical iteration to solve by computer. We analyze this problem and show how to solve it quickly.     

The hexaparagon

A hexagon with each pair of opposite sides parallel to a side of a triangle will be called a hexaparagon for that triangle. One way to construct a hexaparagon for a given triangle ABC is to use as vertices the centroids P, Q, R, S, T, and U of the six non-overlapping sub-triangles formed by the three medians of triangle ABC. The perimeter of this hexaparagon is half the perimeter of triangle ABC. The ratio of the areas of triangle ABC to this hexaparagon is 36 to 13 and the lengths of the parallel sides are in the ratio 6 to 2 to 1. The vertices of this hexaparagon lie on an ellipse and, with a second type of hexaparagon introduced later, hexaparagons tile the plane.     

On the structure of clique‐free graphs

Using a clever inductive counting argument Erd?s, Kleitman and Rothschild showed in 1976 that almost all triangle‐free graphs are bipartite, i.e., that the cardinality of the two graph classes is asymptotically equal. In this paper we investigate the structure of the “few” triangle‐free graphs which are not bipartite. As it turns out, with high probability, these graphs are bipartite up to a few vertices. More precisely, almost all of them can be made bipartite by removing just one vertex. Almost all others can be made bipartite by removing two vertices, and then three vertices and so on. We also show that similar results hold if we replace “triangle‐free” by K_??+1‐free and “bipartite” by ??‐partite. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. Random Struct. Alg., 19, 37–53, 2001     

Non-Unit Free Triangle Orders

A Free Triangle order is a partially ordered set in which every element can be represented by a triangle. All triangles lie between two parallel baselines, with each triangle intersecting each baseline in exactly one point. Two elements in the partially ordered set are incomparable if and only if their corresponding triangles intersect. A unit free triangle order is one with such a representation in which all triangles have the same area. In this paper, we present an example of a non-unit free triangle order.     

Motion of a nonlinear viscoelastic liquid in cylindrical channels of triangular cross section

The problem of the nonrectilinear steady-state flow of a nonlinear viscoelastic liquid in cylindrical channels is considered. It is established that in channels whose cross sections form an equilateral triangle or an isosceles right-angled triangle there are six transverse currents (eddies) in a plane perpendicular to the main longitudinal flow. In cylinders with cross sections in the form of an arbitrary triangle there may be four or six eddies, depending on the shape of the triangle.     

Pizza again? On the division of polygons into sections with a common origin

The paper explores the division of a polygon into equal-area pieces using line segments originating at a common point. The mathematical background of the proposed method is very simple and belongs to secondary school geometry. Simple examples dividing a square into two, four or eight congruent pieces provide a starting point to discovering how to divide a regular polygon into any number of equal-area pieces using line segments originating from the centre. Moreover, it turns out that there are infinite ways to do the division. Discovering the basic invariant involved allows application of the same procedure to divide any tangential polygon, as after suitable adjustment, it can be used also for rectangles and parallelograms. Further generalization offers many additional solutions of the problem, and some of them are presented for the case of an arbitrary triangle and a square. Links to dynamic demonstrations in GeoGebra serve to illustrate the main results.     

Each maximal planar graph with exactly two separating triangles is Hamiltonian

A classical result of Whitney states that each maximal planar graph without separating triangles is Hamiltonian, where a separating triangle is a triangle whose removal separates the graph. Chen [Any maximal planar graph with only one separating triangle is Hamiltonian J. Combin. Optim. 7 (2003) 79-86] proved that any maximal planar graph with only one separating triangle is still Hamiltonian. In this paper, it is shown that the conclusion of Whitney's Theorem still holds if there are exactly two separating triangles.     

Robust intersection of structured hexahedral meshes and degenerate triangle meshes with volume fraction applications

Two methods for calculating the volume and surface area of the intersection between a triangle mesh and a rectangular hexahedron are presented. The main result is an exact method that calculates the polyhedron of intersection and thereafter the volume and surface area of the fraction of the hexahedral cell inside the mesh. The second method is approximate, and estimates the intersection by a least squares plane. While most previous publications focus on non-degenerate triangle meshes, we here extend the methods to handle geometric degeneracies. In particular, we focus on large-scale triangle overlaps, or double surfaces. It is a geometric degeneracy that can be hard to solve with existing mesh repair algorithms. There could also be situations in which it is desirable to keep the original triangle mesh unmodified. Alternative methods that solve the problem without altering the mesh are therefore presented. This is a step towards a method that calculates the solid area and volume fractions of a degenerate triangle mesh including overlapping triangles, overlapping meshes, hanging nodes, and gaps. Such triangle meshes are common in industrial applications. The methods are validated against three industrial test cases. The validation shows that the exact method handles all addressed geometric degeneracies, including double surfaces, small self-intersections, and split hexahedra.     

The near-peer mathematical mentoring cycle: studying the impact of outreach on high school students’ attitudes toward mathematics

College students may be seen as near-peers to high school students and high school students are often able to see themselves in the college students who are but one step ahead. This nearness in maturity and educational level may place college students in a particularly powerful position when it comes to reaching out to high school students to promote higher education in math and science. In this study college students gave dynamic mathematics outreach presentations, MathShows, to minority and low-income high school students in a mid-sized public school district on the U.S. border with Mexico. The study investigated the impacts of this sort of outreach work on high school students’ attitudes towards mathematics using a mathematics attitudes survey. Results, obtained from N = 306 participants, showed statistically significant improvements in almost all components of mathematical attitudes, with less of an effect on the component of self-confidence in doing mathematics. Differences in impacts by specific student subgroups are all discussed.     

Mapping Planar Graphs into Projective Cubes

Projective cubes are obtained by identifying antipodal vertices of hypercubes. We introduce a general problem of mapping planar graphs into projective cubes. This question, surprisingly, captures several well‐known theorems and conjectures in the theory of planar graphs. As a special case , we prove that the Clebsch graph, a triangle‐free graph on 16 vertices, is the smallest triangle‐free graph to which every triangle‐free planar graph admits a homomorphism.