Three's a Crowd (This is Math?)

For readers not familiar with this feature on my blog, let me explain.  I home schooled my four children and eventually specialized in teaching math.  I found other ways for my kids to learn all the other topics, but I learned the math along with them.  Over and Over again.  (Even up to Calculus!)  I decided math should be FUN and students should know the reason they have to learn stuff, so I try to make math mean something.

This feature is here for Moms with kids from about 4 or 5 years old up to about 7th grade, no matter how you school them.  Math ought to be a topic of conversation in life.  It helps kids not fear math, and (maybe) even enjoy it. There is a tab at the top of my blog that quickly links you to all the past posts in "This is Math?"

Today our adventures in math take us beyond numbers...  Rather than always thinking that you have to get ONE RIGHT ANSWER, sometimes math requires creativity.  Exploration.  Trial and Error.  Divergent thinking.  You start with a math idea - and it takes you somewhere else.

Which is why I'm calling this post "Three's a Crowd".
When we think of THREE maybe we start with math,
but all these other topics seem to crowd in!

You see games, geography, literature, language, culture...

Copy this Tic-Tac-Toe board and paste it to a word processing document so you can print it out. Each student should pick THREE squares and then complete each task in each of those squares.  They might want to try make a tic-tac-toe.

With 3 people, count to 50 (or 100) each saying one number in order. The third person is “It” and says their numbers louder than the rest. 1	Learn to play Rock, Paper, Scissors.  Play three rounds with each member of your family.	Track a Triangle.  Find three-sided figures in your house, on the road, and/or in the store.
Count by threes to 99.	Name items that come in threes. 2	Learn the term “Hat Trick”.  Play a hat tossing game.  Can you toss a hat into a circle three times in a row?
Look at a map of the United States and find places where 3 states meet at one point.	Look in a dictionary and find words that begin with “TRI”.  Make a list of these words that have to do with the number three.	Learn how to tell if a number can be divided evenly by three.

                      ¹ one two THREE four five SIX seven eight NINE (etc)

                      ² Here are a list of topics to consider:

                      3 colors that go together

                      Foods

                      Games and rules in games

                      Cities with three words in their name

                      Stories or movies with “3” in the title

           

These are just activities that let you have fun with your kids.  But it makes them think about MATH THINGS - in fairly creative ways. 

Have fun at least three times this week!

CathyH

Roman Numerals (This is Math?)

This is the year of the XXX Olympiad.
And it was the year of the XLVI Super Bowl.

It's not the Extra Extra Extra Large Olympics...
So, what do all these letters mean?

Just trying to build a case for the need to understand Roman Numerals!  Your students can make index cards with one Roman Numeral on each and arrange the cards in correct order to indicate numbers - from one to a thousand - or more!!!
Roman Numerals use uppercase letters to indicate numbers. 

I means one

V means 5

X means 10

L means 50

C means 100

D means 500

M means 1000

You can Google “Roman Numerals” and find all kinds of things.  Clear directions are posted at this web address:

http://www.factmonster.com/ipka/A0769547.html

Copy this Tic-Tac-Toe board and paste it to a word processing document so you can print it out. Each student should pick THREE squares and then complete each task in each of those squares.  They might want to try make a tic-tac-toe.

Learn how to write Roman Numerals one to five. Make index cards for each child. 1	Learn how to write Roman Numerals six to ten.  Make index cards for each child. 2	Learn how to write Roman Numerals eleven to twenty.  Make index cards for each child 3
Listen to and learn “There are 18 Wheels on a Big Rig” 4	Learn how to write Roman Numerals twenty one to fifty.  Make index cards for each child. 5	Learn how to write Roman Numerals fifty one to one hundred. Make index cards for each child. 6
Find Roman numerals in books, on DVDs or videos.  What number do they indicate?	Learn how to write Roman numerals for numbers above one hundred and into the thousands. 7	Find out what is the difference between a NUMBER and a NUMERAL.

¹ Each child will need 4 cards: I  I  I and V

² Each child will need 5 cards: I  I  I  V and X

³ Each child will need 6 cards: I  I  I  V  X and another X

⁴ This is a silly little song!  Here are two child-appropriate versions on the internet:

Cartoon:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGOdYOa0Y54&feature=related

Trout Fishing in America

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=octRsBAa8uA&feature=related

⁵ Each child will need 6 cards: I  I  I  V  X X and another X and a L

⁶ Each child will need  cards: I  I  I  V X  X  X  X  L and C

⁷ Each child will need cards: I  I  I  V X  X  X  X  L  C C  C  C  and M

Go forth and COUNT!!

CathyH

Feet (This is Math?)

Today I want you to explore feet.  The unit-of-measurement kind of feet.  And just to teach a little humor in our language, I'm asking the kids to measure their own feet.

Find a ruler that measures one foot. Find 3 things that are the same length as the ruler.  Find 3 things that are shorter and 3 things that are longer than the ruler.	Does anyone in your family have feet that are a foot long?	How tall is the front door in your house?  How wide is it?  Is it the same size as other doors in your house?
How tall are the ceilings in your house?	How many inches in a foot?  How many feet in a yard?  How many inches in a yard?	How tall is each person in your house?  Give measurement in feet plus inches.
Have a hopping competition.  Hop on one foot.  How many feet can you hop?	Play a throwing game (ideas below).  Guess how far you threw the object, then measure it to see how good you are at guessing feet.	Find out how many feet are in a mile.  Memorize this number.

 INDICATING UNITS: When you have the students measure things - teach them how to indicate the unit of measurement.  For the unit FEET they can write "feet" or "foot" (if there is only one of them) or they can abbreviate with "ft."  Additionally there is the little apostrophe that can actually indicate the unit FEET . . . "My ceilings are 8' tall".  You will probably need to talk about inches, also.  They can write "inches" or "in" or use the double apostrophe (like this: 8" to mean 8 inches).  The apostrophe indication of feet and inches works very well when you have to report in feet AND inches (like in heights of people)  5'4" is 5 feet, 4 inches.

For a THROWING GAME, you might want to NOT use a ball - as it will roll away before you can measure the initial distance it was thrown.  Here are some ideas of objects to throw:
toss pennies
wad up paper
bean bags
roll toy cars until they stop
spit watermelon seeds

FEET PER MILE: Most of my children run long distance races.  They keep their mind busy converting the kilometers to meters, then to quarter miles and to miles.  And sometimes you just need to know how many feet in a mile.  If your students memorize 5,280 feet per mile they may win trivia games and be at an advantage in their physics class years from now. And run faster and jump higher...

Happy Feet!!

Cathy H

Number Our Days (This is Math?)

When our children are young babies we give their age in DAYS. Eventually we speak of how many MONTHS old - and then we start to round to the nearest YEAR or half a year.

When telling how old a child is, the real problem is - IT CHANGES EVERY DAY!!

Seems like a good opportunity to incorporate MATH.

This week's "This is Math?" helps you focus on some facts that your children just ought to know.  Most kids know their own birthdate.  Teach them to love their siblings by knowing those birth dates, also.  (Teach them the birthdays of Mom and Dad when they are young and they will be able to remember your birthday when they go away to college or have families of their own!)

I believe you should be able to copy this Tic-Tac-Toe board and paste it to a word processing document. Each student should pick THREE (or even more!) squares and then complete each task in each of those squares.  They might want to try make a tic-tac-toe.

How many days in a week?  What are their names?  Can you say them BACKWARDS?	How many month in the year?  What are their names?  Each month is given a number in the order they occur in the year.  Learn these.	How many days in a year?
How many days in each month?  (Learn the little poem)	How many weeks in a year?  How many weeks before June?  How many weeks before Thanksgiving?  Christmas?	How many years old are you?  How many weeks old are you?  What about your siblings?
What is your birthdate?  How many days until your birthday? Learn to tell your birthday using numbers.	Learn the birthdates of your family members. Learn, also, that DOB means "Date of Birth".	How many days old are you?  Your siblings?

You could expand your exploration into other languages - learning the days of the weeks and the names of the months in another language.  You could also learn to count up to 31 in another language.

With the months of the year you can play a game - even driving down the road.  You name a month, the kids have to figure out what NUMBER is associated with that month.  Or, you give a number between 1 and 12 and they name the month.  Make it a contest if it would be fair, or take turns, asking easier questions of the younger children.

You remember the poem about the number of days in each month?   You can google this - and you might also find a little devise using your knuckles to help know how many days in a given month.

Number your days, but count your blessings!
CathyH

Psalm 90:12 says "Teach us to number our days aright, that we may gain a heart of wisdom."

Fractions are Half the Fun (This is Math?)

This week I have just a few ideas to introduce fractions.  Well, halves.

Have you ever watched "Finding Nemo"?  The sharks' pledge includes "Fish are friends, not food".  Well, in math you may have to repeat this pledge:

  "Fractions are our friends". 

Granted, some friends are difficult.  Some are hard to understand.  But we are loyal to friends.  We like our friends.  And SOMEDAY you will be glad that fractions are YOUR friends.

Some of the activities I included today would be good in the car. You know when.  Kids start to whine.  Mom starts to whine.  Mom can start the "Even or Odd" game by calling a child's name and a number and asking "Even or Odd?"  (Hint: a number is even if it ends in 2 or 4 or 6 or 8 or zero)(the zeros might be hard for the kids - but you can teach that even if you are driving the car!).  If your clever child gets too complicated for the others - say that the numbers have to be less than ten!

I believe you should be able to copy this Tic-Tac-Toe board and paste it to a word processing document. Each student should pick THREE squares and then complete each task in each of those squares.  They might want to try make a tic-tac-toe.

Count by twos. (Older children count up to 100, youngest to 10)	Start at 50 (or 30 or 100) and count by twos BACKWARDS.	Play the “Even or Odd game.  “It” gets to choose a number and the contestants decide if it is even or odd.  If the contestant is right, they become “It” and ask another contestant.
Roll two dice.  First one represents the tens digit in a number, second die represents the ones digit.  Write the number.  If it is even, what is half of it?	Give each child a pile of small toys like toy bricks, stuffed animals or blocks.  Ask them to put them into two equal groups.	Learn how to deal cards with just two people playing cards.  Count how many cards you have after they are dealt.  How many cards are there all together?
(Remove the face cards & call Aces “one”) Play “War” with just two people.	Play the “Halves” game.  “It” gets to choose an even number, the contestants determine what half of it is.	How can you divide an odd number into halves?  Practice this at snack time or dinner.  5 cookies, 2 people?  15 crackers 2 people?...  How many potatoes so everyone gets one half?

Repeat after me: "Fractions are our Friends"

CathyH

Baseball (This is Math?)

Welcome to the third installment of "THIS IS MATH?"  (Sorry I missed last week.) (I still hope to post these activities once a week)

Take me out to the Ballgame!!!

If you don’t know anything about baseball – NOW IS THE TIME!!!  It’s a beautiful day for a ballgame!!  Have your student(s) pick three activities from the chart below.  I've included some notes and details after the chart.  Remember: this is supposed to be FUN.

Learn the song: “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.” This song is traditionally sung in the middle of the 7th inning.  Sing it once a day for a week.	List the names of all the major league teams in (choose one) a) your state  b) the American league c) the National league d) America	List what the colors are for major league baseball teams.  (see box to the left to choose a group of teams to research their colors).
List the names of the baseball parks where the major league teams play.  Find the cities on a map of the United States.	The next time you mow your yard, just mow a diamond in your grass to represent the infield.  Have races around the bases.	Pick a team and follow it for a whole month.  Every day record if they win or if they lose.  Calculate their winning percentage every morning.
Pick a team and examine their batting averages today.  Put the averages in order from highet to lowest to see who is the best batter on that team as of today.	Find out: How many players are out on the field at a time.  How many innings are played.  How many strikes make an out.  How many balls make a walk.  How many “how many-s” can you think of?	Pick a favorite player to follow this week.  Calculate  his batting average every day.  Do this to make sure the newspaper or web do their math correctly! (see below)

You can check out sing-a-longs on YouTube so you can learn the words and tune to “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.”  There is a good chance you will learn the whole song if you sing it 7 days in a row.

Have your students make NICE lists.  They can surely try to use neat handwriting – maybe even using the correct colors for the teams!  You can play games with these lists.  “Which team in Texas is red and blue?”  “Which team plays in a ballpark called Fenway Park?”

Winning average can be computed this way: “Number of wins” divided by “Total games played”.  Some students can do this statistic on paper – since only a few games have been played the math won't be too hard.  You can let them use a calculator, also.  Give the answer to 3 decimal places.

Batting average is computed this way:  “Number of hits” divided by “Number of at-bats”.  Both of these numbers should be available in your newspaper or on the web on the baseball team home pages.  (The team's numbers will probably be in a big chart... with LOTS of numbers.  Look for the column with an "H" at the top to find Hits.  Look for the column with "AB" at the top to find At-Bats.)  The current batting average will be written there – but how do you know they did their math correctly?  Let your students use a calculator for this – and give the answer to 3 decimal places.  It’s early in the season, so the number of hits and the number of at-bats will still be fairly low.

And having your very own baseball field in your lawn???  The neighbors will envy you!  And it can all be mowed the same height after your races (or at the end of the day) (or next week!)

"I don't care if I never get back!"

CathyH

Ten Jacks (This is Math?)

Welcome to the second week of "This is Math?"  If you hoped to find quilting stuff, check out some of my previous posts.  But you MIGHT like this, too!!

Being a teacher at heart, a retired homeschooler, and loving math, I am attempting to give math ideas - FUN math ideas - to Moms who are teaching their elementary aged kids at home and Moms who just need some ideas to motivate number curiosity in their children.

Today I wanted to focus on TEN.  God gave most of us ten fingers and ten toes, and our number system is based on the number TEN.

One game that I enjoyed when I was in elementary school was the game of Jacks.  Maybe you did too.

If you do not know how to play jacks, I suggest you visit this website. It includes rules, pictures, suggestions and ideas about learning to play jacks.

You may not have a set of jacks.  I googled it and believe you can get some at Toys R us.  Sometimes you can find them in the (measly) toy sections of grocery stores.

You could still play the game "Jacks" using any little ball you have on hand - and your favorite dry cereal.  (You might want them to play the game on a clean kitchen table rather than the floor if they plan to eat the cereal!!)

WARNING:  This game includes small parts!!  If you have little children who might be tempted to taste the ball or the jacks you may need some close supervision.  My motto:  "Jacks are toys, not food" might help.

Oh - the math part.  When your kids get good at Jacks, up to "threesies" "foursies" "fivesies" and "sixsies" I think there is a connection with percents and division and remainders.   When they pick up three jacks, how many times will they have to pick up three?  How many will be leftover? When they go to pick up six jacks, ask - how many jacks will you LEAVE?

Or just let them play.

I believe you should be able to copy this Tic-Tac-Toe board and paste it to a word processing document. Each student should pick THREE squares and then complete each task in each of those squares.  They might want to try make a tic-tac-toe.

Count your fingers.  Now count your toes. Count from ten, backwards, to one.	How many fingers are there in your household?  How many fingers in your extended family? (include aunts, uncles, grandparents, maybe cousins)	How many fingers AND toes are there in your household?
Count to 100 by tens. Can you count to 1000 by tens?	Learn to play Jacks.  Use 10 jacks.  Practice tossing the ball, letting it bounce, and catching it with the same hand.	Learn to play Jacks.  Use 10 jacks.  Practice tossing the jacks on the floor so they are separated from each other – but not too far apart.
Learn to play Jacks.  Use 10 jacks.  Practice ‘Onesies’.  Toss the jacks.  Toss the ball up, pick up one jack and catch the ball in the same hand.	Practice ‘Twosies’. You may want to just put 2 jacks near each other and practice picking up a pair without interference from other jacks.	Play jacks.  Use 10 jacks.

Have fun!!

Next week we will explore Random Number Generators (like dice, drawing straws, casting lots)

CathyH

M & M’s are the Best Candy. (This is Math?)

Here is the first installment of  “This is Math?”

This is a feature suitable for students from Kindergarten age and up to 6th or 7th grade.  My plan is to give Moms some Math ideas to encourage thinking with numbers.  Maybe your children are good at math?  Then this is just fun.  Maybe your children do not like math?  Don't tell them this is math.  Just tell them you want to play a game.  This week we will play with CHOCOLATE.  These activities are created to work with the "fun size" M&M's bag.  I chose the Spring package - but it would probably work with any kind of "fun size" bag of yumminess that is M&M's.

I was successful in copying this tic-tac-toe board from the blog to a word processing document.  You can do it too!  Click on the tic-tac-toe board.  This should take you to the opportunity to look at my two pictures in this post.  If you choose the board and right click, you will see the option "Save Image as...".  Choose this, and you will see a window open that requests WHERE on your computer you want to save this image (maybe you will save it on your desktop and then file it later).  Name it (something like M&M!) and save.  Now it's on your desktop, ready to print and play!

Each student should pick THREE squares to make a tic-tac-toe, and then complete each task in each of those chosen squares.  This may involve some cooperation!

If you have younger kids, pick 2 squares for them that seem appropriate.

Various ideas for counting the candies:

1. Use small paper cups.

2. Place the candies on foil or waxed paper to keep them clean.

3. Use a piece of paper.  Line up each color of candy and trace around the line it makes with the same color crayon or pencil. (You can compare sizes of lines to compare number of candies).

Ideas for finding averages:

1. Deal out the candies (or bags) like you would deal cards (“One for Daddy, one for Mommy, one for sister, one for me.  One for Daddy….”) Count the number each person got.

2.  Add up all the numbers of candies from each bag.  Use dimes to represent ten candies and pennies to represent 1 candy.  For instance: 32 candies could be represented by 32 cents.  Represent each bag’s candies with coins. Then deal out the dimes and pennies evenly.

3. Do the math – with a paper and pencil or learn to use a calculator.  Add up all the candies in each bag and divide by the number of bags.

Do you have friends with children who need to enjoy math?  Tell them about this new feature – and watch on Thursdays.

Maybe Moms need to try it too!

CathyH

New Feature - Coming Soon

You may have noticed on my profile, that I am a retired homeschooler - and that I teach math.  I like math.  I like to see how math works in everyday life.  I like for KIDS to see some reason to work on their math schoolwork.  I think kids should LIKE to do math because they see it is functional, necessary, interesting.

So.

I am planning a new feature on this blog.  You will see a new tab at the top of the blog: "This is Math? "  Each Thursday (well, most Thursdays, I hope) I will post activities for late in the school week.  They will consist of a list of 9 activities.  In a Tic-Tac-Toe board.  Your students, if you should chose to participate, choose 3 of the items from the board in order to form a Tic-Tac-Toe.  If you have younger children, you might choose fewer.  You will notice that the activities go from somewhat simple to more complex as you move down the chart.

The activities this week will require a bag of Fun-Size M&M's.

Watch this blog for details on Thursday!!
CathyH