One of the biggest topics in mathematical education is the
integration of math concepts into “real world” scenarios. When children see how we as adults use
mathematics in our daily life it makes learning the subject relevant for them.
Recently, I came across a very interesting article in Time
magazine entitled “Beyond Counting Sheep.
Why math is the hot new bedtime reading”, by Bonnie Rochman. This article is about an astrophysicist
turned stay at home mom whose mission is to “change the way parents put their
kids to bed”. The mom, Laura Bilodeau
Overdeck, is the founder of a great web-site called Bedtime Math (Bedtimemath.org). This web-site offers interesting “real world”
problems that are fun for every age group and center on current events,
holidays, and home life. Her vision is
to have parents problem solve with their children as part of their nightly
routine; as you would read your child a story, you would also solve a problem
together. Solutions to each problem can
also be found on this web-site.
I hope you have an opportunity to try this web-site and
approach out.
In the meantime here are
some sample problems from Bedtimemath.org:
Skydiving has been a
favorite topic here, because there are few things in life as dramatic as
hurling yourself out of a plane from thousands of feet above the ground. Well, this group of 100 skydivers took it to a new level: they all jumped out
of planes at the same time, then used their wingsuits to steer themselves into
a nice neat square formation of people in the sky. It set the record for the
number of people in one skydive formation – well, okay, that’s because it’s the
first formation anyone has turned in for the record. But given that it
took 100 people from 21 countries jumping out of 5 planes, they obviously
earned the honor.
Wee ones: If you were one of the divers and you were on
the 1st of the 5 airplanes to take off, how many planes took off after you?
Little kids:
The skydivers jumped from 13,000 feet. If they didn’t pull their parachutes
until they were 6,000 feet above the ground, for how many thousands of feet did
they fall first? Bonus: If the 100 skydivers were divided evenly among
the 5 planes, how many people jumped out of each one?
Big kids: The 100 divers spread out in an almost
perfect square in the sky. If it had been a perfect square, how many people
wide would that square have to be? Bonus: To skydive wearing a wingsuit,
you need to do at least 200 dives before that. At least how many dives must the
group of 100 have done in total before this? (Hint: to multiply a number by
100, tack 2 zeroes on to the end of it.)
