What was the purpose of this week of investigations and video watching? I think the purpose of this weeks investigations and video watching was to get people inspired for the math year. The videos made it very clear anybody can succeed in math if they put in the work and nobody is not a math person. Give an overview of the videos and activities: The videos all were uplifting a motivating and encouraged people to use their hands to solve problems. We did a lot of problems this week in which using our hands helped a lot. The videos should how all people see things different ways which we saw when we tried to tile a 11x13 rectangle as a class. Choose to messages from the videos that were personal to you: The two messages that stood out to me were nobody is a math person and mistakes makes your brain grow more than getting the right answer all the time. These were very meaningful to me because I always viewed myself as not being a math person because I always struggle with silly mistakes but, knowing that that has actually helped me grow has made me feel a lot better about that situation. Provide a write up of the problem you choose: The problem i choose to write up were hailstone sequences. I found hailstone sequences very interesting. In hailstone sequences if the number is even you divide by 2 and if the number is odd you multiply by three then add one. The goal is to always get back to 1. With that formula it always seems to work which is very interesting to me. In class, I started with the number 42. My sequence: 42,21,64,32,16,8,4,2,1 Then I tried 11: 11,34,17,52,26,13,40,20,10,5,16,8,4,2,1 It was so mind boggling to me that with that formula it always got back to 1 so, I made up my own formula. My formula: If even divide by 4, if odd add 5. My formula did not have the end result of one. Example starting with number 20: 20,5,10,2.2,0.55 Clearly there is something magical about the hailstone sequence that it ends in one and I have yet to figure it out. I am still very intrigued. How has this week inspired my performance and how will it effect my performance this year? I feel like I have done very well this week learning group work norms and feel inspired by the videos. It was a little scary knowing I needed to post on my DP because i am new to High Tech High but i think I am adjusting well.