Elizabeth had some homework this week which involved asking a member of her family to write some random numbers between 0 and 1,000 on a piece of paper for her to put in the correct numerical order. She asked her father and this is what he gave her:
869, 17, 3.5, 29, 19, 437, 832, 999, 1, 412, 3, e, π, √2
Elizabeth is 7 years old.
rachel.blog 
I laughed my socks off when I read this!! Thanks for posting.
Good! I’m glad to hear it.
I’m impressed you could find all those symbols on your keyboard. I can’t!
Christine, who was a teaching assistant before retiring, just said “Awww! Wicked”
Oh! Tell Elizabeth’s father that if he wants his daughter to hate math, keep doing what he’d doing!
On the other hand, I wish I’d had a father who was good in math. I had to struggle all through high school with algebra with no one to help me at home. It took Khan Academy to actually teach me the principles of mathematics, 40 years later.
I struggled through maths in high school too. Having someone at home to help makes a big difference, I’m sure. I’ll have to wait another 10 years to see what Elizabeth thinks of it then 🙂
Love this
My Dad was like that!
But I bet Elizabeth still managed to order most of them.
I think Ben gave her some hints 🙂
I don’t see what all the fuss is about. Just for the record, the homework didn’t say they had to be *whole numbers*. Anyway, all but two of the numbers were rational, and only two were transcendental.
As Rachel said, I did give Elizabeth some hints.
Hilarious! 😀
That was more than a bit cruel….
😝
My husband would do the same thing……
Ha, amazing 🙂
Isabel went to school as the imaginary number when she was six. Nice easy costume when you have to think of mathematical fancy dress.
Oh she just gave up maths though. Decided not to do it for A level.
Reading the title I had expected the insufferable mathematician to refuse to give Elizabeth any numbers because anything he would write down would not be *random* numbers.