This man is why my father became an engineer

As a boy growing up in West Virginia, my father wanted to study science but a high school teacher convinced him he had no talent for it.

That man was not why my father became an engineer.

My father joined the Navy, served in the Korean War and became a non-commissioned officer.

While enlisted, he took a class in radio/radar technology. The instructor, a well-respected engineer, turned out to be a great teacher – at least for my father. Which is great enough for me.

Vacuum tubes in an old radioMy father became the best student in the class. The instructor’s encouragement convinced him to pursue a career in engineering.

My father earned degrees in electrical and a nuclear engineering and made a long career working with technologies evolved from those he learned in that first class.

Now retired, my father decided to find out who this teacher was who had made such an impact on his life.

***

Nick Holonyak invented the Light Emitting Diode (LED). He is winner of the IEEE Medal of Honor.

Before that he was the first post graduate student of John Bardeen who with fellow Nobel Laureate, Walter Brattain, invented the first transistor.

Somewhere in between these accomplishments, he taught engineering to a class of military personnel.

When my father speaks of Nick Holonyak it is with gratitude and wonder.

***

New York City FIRST LEGO League ChampionshipMy father, the engineer, encouraged me to love science. I studied mathematics and physics and make my living building software.

I encourage my grade school aged daughter to love science. This year, my daughter’s robotics team competed at the New York City FIRST LEGO League Championship.

These are perhaps small things to a man who assisted Nobel Laureates, won prestigious engineering awards, worked at Bell and GE Labs and continues to teach at a research university in a position he’s held for over forty years.

But Nick Holonyak is the reason my father became an engineer. His teaching kindled an enthusiasm that is a source of generational wealth to our family.

Thank you.

Low Traction Subtraction

Subtraction using Everyday MathThis is what a solved subtraction problem looks like using the technique my second grader is learning.

At first she was drawing all sixty squares. I talked her into drawing tens as long rectangles.

A page of homework is 20 problems. Each problem takes 3-5 minutes. She also has writing and reading.

To fight the tedium, we used legos one day and a whiteboard another.

But the teacher likes to see the written squares to confirm the kids understand. So while making things physical makes it more fun it only adds time.

I know she’s drifting when she starts climbing the table or erases mistakes until the paper rips.

Any constructive advice?

Addition Problem

Addition ProblemI was helping my daughter with her homework.

She said her teacher didn’t want her carrying over tens the way I was showing her, “she hadn’t taught it to them yet.”

Stumped by that one, the best I could suggest was doing it anyway and erasing the evidence.

  1. 5+7 = 12,
  2. write 2 in the ones place,
  3. carry the ten into the tens place,
  4. 10+20+30 = 60,
  5. write the 6 in the tens place,
  6. ERASE the hell out of that damn ‘1’ so you don’t get a crying child who hates arithmetic…