Teenage girls these days are more and more getting lured into thinking they should dumb themselves down, and that's going to attract the wrong kind of guy, and it's serious. It's serious business.

I want to help middle-school girls stay interested in math and be good at it, and see it as friendly and accessible and not this scary thing. Everyone else in society tells them it's not for them. It's for nerdy white guys with pocket protectors.

I wasn't in school often enough to really belong to a 'clique,' but my friends all studied hard and got pretty good grades. They were good people with self-respect. I still like to be friends with people I admire something about; I really believe that we become like the people we're surrounded by, so I choose my friends carefully!

I had done quite a bit of research about math education when I spoke before Congress in 2000 about the importance of women in mathematics. The session of Congress was all about raising more scholarships for girls in college. I told them I felt that it's too late by college.

I played Winnie Cooper on 'The Wonder Years' from ages 12-18, and did a few other movies during some of the summers.

I've done a little directing, but I love acting more.

I took a break from acting for four years to get a degree in mathematics at UCLA, and during that time I had the rare opportunity to actually do research as an undergraduate. And myself and two other people co-authored a new theorem: Percolation and Gibbs States Multiplicity for Ferromagnetic Ashkin-Teller Models on Two Dimensions, or Z2.

I love acting. Acting is a true love of mine, acting and math. Although they are both creative, they use very different sides of your brain. And I love both. Acting is my first love, and that's my main career, it really is.

Acting is my first love, and that's my main career, it really is.

I learned my French through school. I was lucky in that the tutor on 'The Wonder Years' set spoke fluent French.

When I originally entered UCLA, I had planned to go for a film major, but I kept finding myself taking math classes for fun, 'cause I missed them from high school!

The fun little proofs that you can do with algebra - they are sort of like crowd pleasers in a way. Like, the .9 repeating equaling one. It doesn't take a lot of algebra to prove that, and it's really fun. It kind of wows people. It's like they're watching magic happen right before their eyes.

I'm the kind of person that responds strongly to a challenge.

You can be obsessed with makeup and hair products and, you know, your appearance and still be absolutely making smart life decisions and work on your smarts, develop your smarts by studying something like math. Then you'll make much better decisions on the brands of clothing that you buy or whatever it is that you want.

I tell students that even if they don't like math right now, they can use math as a brain-sharpening tool - a tool that not only builds the foundation for a great career, but that also builds self-confidence, no matter what they choose to do with their lives.

I've been eating tons of organic foods, staying away from processed sugars, white flours, and anything artificial. It's the same as my normal regime, but I'm being even stricter, because everything I put into my body is literally building this precious baby inside me.

Let's make math fun and sexy and glamorous. Smart is sexy, that's one of my main messages.

A lot of girls think they have to choose between being the smart geeky type or the beautiful bimbo.

Students never think it can be the teacher's fault and so I thought I was stupid. I was frustrated and would come home and cry because I couldn't do it. Then we got a new teacher who made math accessible. That made all the difference and I learned that it's how you present it that makes it scary or friendly.

I went to about one frat party a year. A year seemed to be enough time for me to forget how much I didn't like frat parties, and my friends would eventually convince me to go to one. Cheap beer, guys looking for a quick hook-up, and girls playing 'dumb' to get in on the hook-up. I just never got into it.

If I had caused any trouble worth mentioning, you would have read about it in 'Star' magazine, which is probably why I didn't cause any trouble worth mentioning.

I love teaching online at my website and soon I'll be writing a math book. I love to teach math. I just don't have time for a full-time teaching gig. Acting is way too time-consuming.

This much I'm sure of. Chances for winning = 1 - (# of math students playing)/ (# of math students cheering). That's a fraction.

I just love math and most people don't.

When I was little, we had a Golden Book that had all these Disney characters in one portrait on the first page. My dad used to read from it every night. We'd play this game of find Pluto or find Donald Duck. He'd read us stories and do all the voices. Those are great memories.

It's really cool when a guy tips 20 per cent quickly and effortlessly so that when the check comes, he opens it and signs his name and done.

I've always been really cautious about guys who have a Winnie Cooper fantasy, and I'm so glad about that. I mean, I can count on one hand the guys I've been with. It was really challenging, but I never gave it up too soon, if you know what I mean.

So somebody told me that if I wasn't a coffee drinker yet, by the end of college I'd have to be, because a math major is so tough I would have to stay up very late. I was going to need coffee to do that. Well, merely because they said that, I never drank coffee in college, never got addicted to it, never needed it.

I noticed there were so many people, especially women, who would come up to me having recognized me from TV and say, 'I heard you were a math person, why math? Oh my gosh, I could never do math!' I could just see their self-esteem crumbling; I thought that was silly, so I wanted to make math more friendly and accessible.

I recognize that I have a unique position to be a role model to young girls because I am doing something that they consider glamorous, which is acting, and yet I took a time to really get my education and study mathematics, and I think math is the cat's meow.

It's such a diversion to be constantly thinking of better ways I can teach people math that my hunger is for that really, for new ways of translating the beauty of it.

Let's face it; by and large math is not easy, but that's what makes it so rewarding when you conquer a problem, and reach new heights of understanding.

I am definitely a serial monogamist. I can count on one hand the number of guys I've been with.

I feel blessed to be having a really easy pregnancy.

I've been just eating very healthy, all organic, no sugar, white flour, nothing artificial. I'm being so incredibly strict... not a lot of meat!

In high school, a teacher once suggested that I be a math major in college. I thought, 'Me? You've got to be joking!' I mean, in junior high, I used to come home and cry because I was so afraid of my math homework. Seriously, I was terrified of math.

If anyone tells you it's impossible to be fabulous and smart and make a ton of money using math, well, they can just get in line behind you - and kiss your math.

Confidence is one of the sexiest things in guys and girls.

When you do take the home pregnancy test, it doesn't quite seem real. But when you see the baby and the heartbeat on the ultrasound, it's so incredible.

There is an epidemic right now of girls dumbing themselves down... in middle school because they think it makes them attractive.

Girls think that being glamorous means making mistakes and being irresponsible. And that's just not true. The smarter you are, the better prepared you are to make decisions in your life, the more likely you are to lead a satisfying life and be glamorous and fun and anything you want to be.

I didn't think that college math was for me. I didn't think I'd be able to hack it. And that perception of math not being for girls, not being for girls who see themselves as socially well adjusted has got to change.

When girls are asking themselves 'Who am I?' for the first time and they hear all this bad PR about math, they think, 'Well, whoever I am, I'm not somebody who likes math.'

If a guy is skilled at anything, that's attractive. There's something very primal about that and, sure, it can be as simple as figuring out the tip quickly. It's really cool when a guy tips 20 percent quickly and effortlessly so that when the check comes, he opens it and signs his name and done.

Look at Jessica Simpson. She's famous for being dumb. I guess it started with Marylyn Monroe, and she actually wasn't that dumb, but that's how she was perceived - and that's what got popular.

When I got to college, I was intending to study film. But I found that my brain was feeling mushy, so I took a few math classes. I started doing really well at them, and solving equations was this, like, drug rush.

Look at Michelle Pfeiffer: My God, she's 50 years old, but she is still so sexy. If I were into women, I would be totally into her.

People talk about 'getting rid of the old image', and I guess there's some merit in that. But the truth is that people loved 'The Wonder Years' - I can't turn my back on it.

I never had little brothers, so I was totally not used to hearing a lot of cussing at a young age! I learned what 'pull my finger' meant the hard way.

I love surprises - champagne and strawberries, all that pampering, romantic stuff. Guys ought to know how to pamper their women properly.