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Is my topic too weak for a Math IA?


spacescampi

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Hello!

 

Math has lately been my weakest subject, and sadly, we have an Exploration to write. Our first draft is supposed to be handed in tomorrow. I have already written 6-7 pages on my IA. However, my topic is "Patterns in Pascal's Triangle", and it just occurred to me that it may be a weak topic... What do you think? I am basically out of ideas, and I think it might be too late to change topic. The Pascal's Triangle was something I just chose to write about because I found it quite interesting when we learned about this, but not something I am very excited about. 

 

I would appreciate any answers, ideas, tips... whatever! I just want to finish it, and get a decent grade.

 

Thanks ^_^

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Hello!

Math has lately been my weakest subject, and sadly, we have an Exploration to write. Our first draft is supposed to be handed in tomorrow. I have already written 6-7 pages on my IA. However, my topic is "Patterns in Pascal's Triangle", and it just occurred to me that it may be a weak topic... What do you think? I am basically out of ideas, and I think it might be too late to change topic. The Pascal's Triangle was something I just chose to write about because I found it quite interesting when we learned about this, but not something I am very excited about. 

I would appreciate any answers, ideas, tips... whatever! I just want to finish it, and get a decent grade.

 

To be honest, I've always advised people to not do their IAs on pascal's triangle because this topic has already been well-understood, thus would restrict you from being 'creative' to explore a different approach towards the topic. However, since it's too late for you to change the topic, I'll try to help you as best as I can by listing some of the stuff that I myself would be eager to know about the Pascal's triangle:

 

1. What is the history of Pascal's triangle? When & where was it created? did people know about it before combinatorics was invented or after? These questions may interest the readers of your IA & will probably show some of your personal engagements. However, note that this should be the minor part of your IA, because there's very little math involving here

 

2. What are the rules that explain the patterns on Pascal's triangles? Here you should list the patterns, explain the rules of these patterns, and most importantly, you should also prove these rules! Remember that your IA shouldn't be a list of the patterns of Pascal's triangle, but it should be a *complete understanding* of each and every pattern that you've mentioned. Some of the properties are pretty easy to prove, like the properties that the sum of all the entries in 1 row is equal to 2n. the proof of this property can be easily done by using simple algebraic manipulatio on the binomial coefficients..... A much more itneresting (but hard) property is about the diagonals in the triangle. How do the diagonals behave? Can each diagonal be described by a sequence? and if it can, what would the rule of that recurrence relation be? Look in here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_triangle#Diagonals.

 

3. How can the study of patterns in Pascal triangle be applied to solving other problems in mathematics? Here you can bring in how pascal's triangle helps understanding better the field of combinatorics....  You can find this pretty much all over the internet.

 

I know that most of the stuff i wrote above are pretty vague. But that all meant for you to explore on your own. Besides, i'm not really an expert in the field of combinatorics so I don't know much about pascal's triangle really. However, I would say that wikipedia has very much information about this topic, so maybe it's a good place to get more ideas.

Good luck!

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To be honest, I've always advised people to not do their IAs on pascal's triangle because this topic has already been well-understood, thus would restrict you from being 'creative' to explore a different approach towards the topic. However, since it's too late for you to change the topic, I'll try to help you as best as I can by listing some of the stuff that I myself would be eager to know about the Pascal's triangle:

 

 

 

 

1. What is the history of Pascal's triangle? When & where was it created? did people know about it before combinatorics was invented or after? These questions may interest the readers of your IA & will probably show some of your personal engagements. However, note that this should be the minor part of your IA, because there's very little math involving here

 

2. What are the rules that explain the patterns on Pascal's triangles? Here you should list the patterns, explain the rules of these patterns, and most importantly, you should also prove these rules! Remember that your IA shouldn't be a list of the patterns of Pascal's triangle, but it should be a *complete understanding* of each and every pattern that you've mentioned. Some of the properties are pretty easy to prove, like the properties that the sum of all the entries in 1 row is equal to 2n. the proof of this property can be easily done by using simple algebraic manipulatio on the binomial coefficients..... A much more itneresting (but hard) property is about the diagonals in the triangle. How do the diagonals behave? Can each diagonal be described by a sequence? and if it can, what would the rule of that recurrence relation be? Look in here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal%27s_triangle#Diagonals.

 

3. How can the study of patterns in Pascal triangle be applied to solving other problems in mathematics? Here you can bring in how pascal's triangle helps understanding better the field of combinatorics....  You can find this pretty much all over the internet.

 

I know that most of the stuff i wrote above are pretty vague. But that all meant for you to explore on your own. Besides, i'm not really an expert in the field of combinatorics so I don't know much about pascal's triangle really. However, I would say that wikipedia has very much information about this topic, so maybe it's a good place to get more ideas.

Good luck!

 

 

I'm so thankful for your answer! I've been following the tips you gave since you answered. It was very helpful, and I appreciate it a lot! I wished I knew that Pascal's Triangle was a bad idea from the start... :P

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  • 5 years later...
On 12/10/2014 at 4:40 PM, spacescampi said:

Hello!

Math has lately been my weakest subject, and sadly, we have an Exploration to write. Our first draft is supposed to be handed in tomorrow. I have already written 6-7 pages on my IA. However, my topic is "Patterns in Pascal's Triangle", and it just occurred to me that it may be a weak topic... What do you think? I am basically out of ideas, and I think it might be too late to change topic. The Pascal's Triangle was something I just chose to write about because I found it quite interesting when we learned about this, but not something I am very excited about. 

I would appreciate any answers, ideas, tips... whatever! I just want to finish it, and get a decent grade.

Thanks ^_^

hey i know im like 5 years late but do you think you can send me your essay? thanks [email protected] it would be much appreciated 

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