Miserable. Week.

This week in class, my 4 stat classes consumed almost 2,000 M&M’s in the name of statistics.

Here’s the breakdown, by color (the percentages next to the colors denote the average breakdown according to M&M/Mars):1

The point of the exercise, of course, is to compare our observed counts of each color to see how well they match the expected proportions, by way of a chi-squared goodness-of-fit test.

Of course, some smart guy chimes in with:

Why don’t they just make all of the percentages the same? They all taste the same…

To which I asked,

When you go shopping for a car, don’t you care what color it is?!2

To which another smart guy had to retort:

Those all taste the same too.

-_-

Perhaps ironically, Skittles are supposedly manufactured with equal proportions of each color… even though those taste different.

Yesterday was my birthday, and I came dangerously close to taking my first sick day of the year.3

Apparently the officers of Mu Alpha Theta4 were going to get me cake, but when they clearly saw that I was having trouble just sitting up straight, brought me this instead:

1. If you’re curious, here are the breakdowns for the different types of M&M’s:

   M&M’S MILK CHOCOLATE: 24% cyan blue, 20% orange, 16% green, 14% bright yellow, 13% red, 13% brown.

   M&M’S PEANUT: 23% cyan blue, 23% orange, 15% green, 15% bright yellow, 12% red, 12% brown.

   M&M’S KIDS MINIS: 25% cyan blue, 25% orange, 12% green, 13% bright yellow, 12% red, 13% brown.

   M&M’S DARK: 17% cyan blue, 16% orange, 16% green, 17% bright yellow, 17% red, 17% brown.

   M&M’S PEANUT BUTTER and ALMOND: 20% cyan blue, 20% orange, 20% green, 20% bright yellow, 10% red, 10% brown.

   M&M’S PRETZEL: 28.5% blue, 14.3% each of yellow, orange, green, brown and red.

   M&M’S COCONUT: 37.5% white, 37.5% brown and 25% green.

   The company also adds:

   “Each large production batch is blended to those ratios and mixed thoroughly. However, since the individual packages are filled by weight on high-speed equipment, and not by count, it is possible to have an unusual color distribution.” [↩]

2. I was trying to make the point that consumer preferences — which is what the company supposedly bases these proportions on — count for a lot [↩]
3. Haven’t taken one of those since the Lakers were NBA champs [↩]
4. which I help co-sponsor [↩]

In all seriousness… there comes a point where we kinda stop “celebrating” these things.

But here is one of the more amusing things students have made me, from back in Season 5:1

…which went along with this cake:

1. 2011-12 [↩]

After the first two days back from Spring Break,1 this is how I feel:

To clarify, I feel like Sonny Liston (the dude lying on his back, looking up at Muhammad Ali).

But at least we managed to keep the ship moving forward.

1. you know, the one that I think should be two weeks long instead of one. [↩]

Well. Spring Break is over.1

No teacher is ready for work tomorrow.2

Almost seven months into the season, and the stretch run is upon us.

In two Fridays, we will be finished with the textbook for AP Stat.3

The AP Exam4 is in nine eight (on May 9).

Three Fridays after that we conclude Spring Finals.5

The end of this tunnel is just around the corner…

1. and I still think it ought to be 2 weeks, not one [↩]
2. and if they tell you that they are, they’re lying [↩]
3. Which, by the way, in my first year of teaching Stat in 2010-11, was the most triumphant moment of the year. Actually I think that may have been the most triumphant moment of all 7+ years to date. I do not miss having to spend 6-10 hours of prep every Saturday for that entire first year… [↩]
4. a.k.a., “Game Day” or “Glory” [↩]
5. a.k.a., “Glory, the sequel” [↩]

NOTE: After changing locations in 2014, the passing periods at my school are no longer 6 minutes — but rather 8. After briefly changing the title of my blog to reflect this, I decided that the title “six minutes of separation” just had a nicer “ring” — and also, the original title was a play on the phrase “six degrees of separation — so I changed it back. This post was written when I worked at a school at which they were six.

In case you’re curious about the significance of the time denomination in the sub-title of this blog, there’s a very simple explanation:

Six minutes is the length of the passing periods at our high school.

If you’re unfamiliar with the way schools generally work: This is the amount of time that students have in between classes to get from one locale to the next.1 2

That’s if you’re a student.

For us teachers, six minutes is all the separation that we get to catch our breath and collect ourselves.

Rough morning class push you to the verge of breaking down in tears? 3 Take six minutes, buck up, and head back out to the battlefield!

Six minutes is also all we get to run to the restroom in between classes.4

Up until a couple of years ago, the passing periods used to be 7 minutes (and there would be a “warning” bell at the 6 minute mark), but when the current leadership team took over in 2011, one of the first changes they made was shortening the passing periods to 5 minutes.

The reaction? Think: New Coke, 1985.5

About a month or so into the campaign, the admin team kindly gave us back a minute, to make it an even 6. 6

Back in the days of “seven minutes of separation”, I used to be able to make it down to the teacher’s lounge, brew up a new pot of coffee, fill up my coffee mug, and make it back to my class in time for the tardy bell — all without breaking a leisurely stride. When the passing periods were shortened to 5 minutes7, this was no longer possible. 8

That’s when I decided that I needed to invest in one of these:

I also have a microwave9 now to complement the coffee maker10 but NOT a refrigerator.11

1. Of course, most kids spend about 5 minutes and 59 seconds socializing before making any attempt to get to their next class. #sadlife [↩]
2. Our school is rather large, and this is not always a lot of time! [↩]
3. Well, I mean, I’m a guy, so I don’t cry, of course, but… yeah. [↩]
4. Not being able to use the restroom at one’s convenience may seriously be one of the biggest adjustments a grown-up has to make upon entering the world of teaching. Given that our classes are 90 minutes in length, we only have a couple of legitimate opportunities each day to allow nature to call. Because of this, I’ve had to exercise discretion when making decisions about what, when, and how much to eat for both breakfast and lunch. Seriously. [↩]
5. You know… rioting, strikes, objects being thrown through windows in protest… okay NOT really. But Will M’s humorous skit at Mr. Mav that year played this theme out as such =) [↩]
6. I wonder… if they changed the length of our passing periods again, would I rename this blog? Hmmmm…. [↩]
7. and even later when they were amended to 6 [↩]
8. My old classroom in upper-C was on the opposite corner of our large campus from the teacher’s lounge. Of course, now that I’m in a different location, perhaps a coffee run might be possible… [↩]
9. which is not a very great microwave, truth be told [↩]
10. which is not a very great coffee maker [↩]
11. I considered it once, but thought: At that point, why not just wave the white flag, surrender any semblance of a social life, bring in a sleeping bag, and just live at school? No, a fridge would be an over-the-line form of surrender, I concluded. [↩]