Shopping for Problem Solvers

With the holidays approaching many of you may be looking for gift ideas for young problem solvers.  A good place to start is the excellent Bookstore run by The Art of Problem Solving.

Among the many excellent resources are two that have been featured on this site that might make particularly good gifts.  The DVD Hard Problems tells the story of the 2006 IMO team.  The profiles of the six team members and the story of how they qualified for and competed in the IMO should encourage any aspiring problem solver.

We have also mentioned an excellent new book by Dr. Titu Andreescu called Problems from the Book.  This book has received excellent reviews and is one of the most searched items on the Metroplex Math Circle site.

If you have any other recommendations for appropriate gift ideas please feel free to post them to the comments.

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NACLO 2009

Adam Hesterberg

Students who excel at math competitions like the AMC 10 and 12 might be interested in participating in the North American Computational Linguistics Olympiad coming up in February.   Similar to the USAMO, this national test is used to select a team to compete internationally in the International Linguistics Olympiad.

Like Math Circles and international problem solving competitions, these linguistics competitions have their origins in Eastern Europe.  They also appear to draw on many of the same problem solving and thinking talents of successful Math Olympians.    In this interview with Adam Hesterberg, a former MATHCOUNTS and USAMO winner, explains how he prepared for his win in last year’s ILO.

For those of us in the Metroplex area it appears that the University of North Texas in Denton will be offering the NACLO this year.

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