CHASING VERMEER

Author :

Blue Balliet

Illustrator:

Brett Helquist

<< Previous slide: The Man On The Wall One of the subject paintings in the book.(The picture on Calder’s box) Vermeer, Jan

The Geographerc. 1668-1669Oil on canvas52 x 45.5 cm (20 1/2 x 17 15/16 in.)

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   A LADY WRITINGThis painting is the star of the story.It is this painting that gets stolen.

c. 1665-1666oil on canvas17 3/4 x 15 3/4 in. (45 x 39.9 cm.)The National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C

Contents :

Pentominoes Speed , distance , time Probability Calder’s code

Pentominoes

“ …Calder had received his first set of pentominoes…Determined, Calder moved the shapes into one combination after another, flipping and turning them. The biggest rectangle he had put together so far was six pieces….the Y had to slide into the U which had to fit next to the P…..

YUP…he had gotten his first twelve piecer…!! ”

(page 13)

Pentominoes :

Pentominoes are puzzle pieces made from exactly five squares. There are a total of 12 pieces, adding up to a total of 60 squares. You can arrange these pieces in four different rectangles. There are many solutions for most, but only two solutions for a 20 x 3 rectangle. You can flip and rotate pieces as much as you want.

Pentominoes

This is how they can be solved..

Speed , distance and time..

“Their (Cadler and Petra’s) houses were 3 blocks away from the U school and 3 houses away from each other.” ..(page 10)

“ The 5.38 south bound train went by Petra’s window exactly three seconds before it passed Cadler’s…Petra had once calculated that it passed a house per second on Harper avenue.” ..(page-18)

Distance is a numerical description of how far apart objects are at any given moment in time. In physics or everyday discussion, distance may refer to a physical length, a period of time, or an estimation based on other criteria

The DISTANCE of Cadler and Petra’s houses from U.school is 3 blocks.

Now, a city block is hardly an appropriate unit for distance.It varies from city to city. But on an average about 16 city blocks make a mile.

So that makes the distance of Cadler and Petra’s houses from their chool to be about (3/16)th of a mile.

DISTANCE

SPEED

distance traveled per unit time a rate (usually rapid) at which something happens. Distance traveled Speed = -------------------------------------------------- Time taken to cover that distanceExample.If a train travels 200 miles in 2 hours. What is its speed?Total Distance : 200 milesTotal time: 2hoursSpeed = 200miles / 2hours = 100miles / hour

PROBABILITY

“ Calder stood up and reached into his pocket. He stirred the pentomino pieces around and pulled one out. “V for Vermeer”…. “One in twelve chance…!!” ”

The chance that a given event will occur. It is an important area of mathematics study and a subject to which young children can be introduced through games of chance, such as coin tosses.

If a fair coin were to be tossed, it has equal probability to give either heads or tails.

Chance of it giving a “head” as output is equal to it giving “tail”.

Therefore, probability of head or probability of tail is ½.

PROBABILITY

PROBABILITY

Similarly, probability of getting the letter “V” out of 12 pieces in the pentominoe set is 1/12. Its the same for any of the 12 pieces.

Probability of drawing a “V” and then drawing a “P”, without replacing any of the pieces that were drawn out

=( probability of drawing a “V” ) * (probability of drawing a “P”)

=(1/12)*(1/11)

=1/256

If two dice were thrown simultaneously , what is that probability that both give sixes?

answer: probability of getting a six in one dice = 1/6(for a six sided dice) therefore , probability of getting 2 sixes = (1/6) * (1/6) = 1/36

CALDER’S CODE

A B C

1 D E F

2 A B C

3 G H I

4 M N O

5 J K L

6 P Q R

7 V W X

8 S T U

9 Y Z

A B C

1 D E F

2 A B C

3 G H I

4 M N O

5 J K L

6 P Q R

7 V W X

8 S T U

9 Y Z

Calder’s Code

Every letter is coded with as the :

Row Label – Coloumn Label

‘Calder’ would be coded as:

C-2 A-2 C-5 A-1 B-1 C-6

‘Petra’ would be coded as:

A-6 B-1 B-8 C-6 A-2

B-8 B-3 B-1 B-1 B-4 A-1