Activity

Magic circles

Characters:

Sofya Aleksandrovna Yanovskaya

Theme: Strategies for deducing reasonable conclusions from a mathematical model.

Competencies

Mathematical competence in science, technology and engineering

Personal, social and learning to learn competence

Competence in cultural awareness and expressions

Subjects and year by Educational System

Spain > Mathematics > 2nd ESO > Algebraic sense

Spain > Mathematics > 2nd ESO > Socio-affective sense

Enunciation

<img title="Women's Legacy logo" src="//inclusion.womenslegacyproject.eu/images/LogoWL.svg" /><hr /><img title="Sofya Aleksandrovna Yanovskaya's Portrait" src="//inclusion.womenslegacyproject.eu/uploads/resume/attachment/2777/Sofia_Aleksandrovka_Yanosvskaya_1.png" alt="Sofya Aleksandrovna Yanovskaya's Portrait" width="208" height="250" />
Sofya Aleksandrovna Yanovskaya, Russian mathematician of Jewish origin of the 20th century, specialist in logic, posed different problems to her students so that they would solve them with perseverance and so that they would continually ask themselves: &lsquo;What am I doing? Where am I going with this ?&rsquo;&nbsp;
We propose you to solve the following mathematical logic problem.
Place the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 in the squares so that each of the circumferences adds up to the same.
<img title="Empty circles" src="//inclusion.womenslegacyproject.eu/uploads/resume/attachment/2778/circulos.png" alt="Empty circles" width="500" height="308" />

Observations and context

- The solution to this problem is not unique. The indicated graphical solution is one of the possible ones, but it is not the only one.

- Different possible solutions could be explored. By interchanging some numbers, more solutions are obtained. For example, if we change the numbers 2 and 5 to the numbers 3 and 4, we get another valid solution.

- As a revolutionary, she took an active part in politics with the communist party during the Russian Revolution, first underground and then as editor of the Kommunist newspaper in Odessa.

- Sofia's predecessors, who also stood out in the field of mathematical logic, are Elena Lucrezia Cornaro Piscopia (1646-1684), Ada Lovelace, forerunner of computer language (1815-1852), and Christine Ladd-Franklin (1847-1930).

- Her contemporaries were also renowned scientists such as Priscilla Fairfield Bok (1896-1975), American astronomer; Mary Lea Heger (1897-1983), American astronomer; Gertrude Blanch (1897-1996), American mathematician; Mary Taylor Slow (1898-1984), British physicist and mathematician; Marguerite Lehr (1898-1987), American mathematician; Charlotte Moore Sitterly (1898-1990), American astronomer; Odette Jasse (1899-1949), French astronomer; Vera Fedorovna Gaze (1899-1954), Soviet astronomer; Pelageya Polubarinova-Kochina (1899-1999), Soviet mathematician; Gertrude Mary Cox (1900-1978), American mathematician and statistician; Ida Rhodes (1900-1986), American mathematician; or Mary Lucy Cartwright (1900-1998), British mathematician, among many others born at the beginning of the 20th century.

- Important researchers such as Isabella Grigoryevna Bashmakova (1921-2005) and Olga Arsenievna Oleinik (1925-2001) stand out among her students.

Description

Solving a problem. To do this, you have to use logic and operations with natural numbers.

Magic circles

Enunciation

Observations and context

Description

Answer

Documents