From a fellow blog, I’ve come across these math sites.  Check them out and leave some feedback!

REASONING

http://www.mathplayground.com/algebraic_reasoning.html

WANGDOODLES

http://www.mathplayground.com/wangdoodles.html

MASTERMIND

http://nlvm.usu.edu/en/nav/frames_asid_288_g_1_t_1.html?open=instructions

My mom asked me to watch my younger brother while she ran a quick errand. Two of my friends stopped by and want to play video games. I’m not supposed to have friends over when my mom’s not home. If they leave before she gets home, she will never know. What should I do?

    One Saturday morning Nina saw the three musketeers in the mall. Jenny, Brittany, and Mitzi called themselves by that name because they always were together.
“I’ve been shopping for sandals,” Jenny told Nina. “But I have such a wide foot nothing seems to fit. We’ve been looking everywhere.”
“And it’s been slow going,” Mitzi added. “On account of Brittany’s-”
“I know,” Nina said, looking at Brittany. “I heard you sprained your ankle in gym yesterday. Does it still hurt a lot?”
“It’s okay as long as I move really slowly,” Brittany told her. “We’re going to get ice cream at the Just Desserts Shop now. Want to join us?”
“Better not. Max is meeting me at home. See you later.”
Nina was taking a short cut through Harborville’s city park when she saw Mr. Hansen kneeling beside a new sidewalk. The city maintenance man frowned as she drew closer. “Somebody jumped right in the middle here while the cement was still wet,” he said, pointing at two narrow footprints embedded in the concrete. “Now I’ll have to rip out this section and re-do it. Sure can’t leave the sidewalk looking like this!”
“Any idea of who did it?” Nina asked.
“A kid over there on the slide said that girls named Brittany, Mitzi, and Jenny were the only ones near here. But he doesn’t know which one ruined my sidewalk.”
“I know who did it,” Nina declared.

How did Nina figure it out?

In the news, there has been many news reports about the taxes, the national debt, and the bailout programs.  I’ve heard many figures and dollar amounts mentioned, but I was having a hard time understanding the true size of these numbers. 

Through the other blogs that I regularly read, I found an interesting site that tried to make these dollar amounts come to life – to visualize them!   You can visit that site at this location: http://www.pagetutor.com/trillion/index.html

According to the website, many people questioned the illustrations used to depict those large dollar amounts.  So the author of the website added another page to the site explaining the calculations used to develop the images.  The link to that page can be found here:  http://www.pagetutor.com/trillion/calculations.html

So, the math challenge this week is slightly different from the previous challenges.  You do not have to do any math or complete any calculations.  Instead, I would like you to do some explaining and identification of the math within those two pages. 

To give you an idea of the math questions going on in my head when I was reading those two pages, I took some notes.  Here are a few of the questions and thoughts I had on those pages.  What types of math do you see being used?  Could some of the math be mental math?  What units are being used? Why?

What types of math do you see?  Can you explain some of the ideas that were  being used? Time to tell me more!

-Mr. Lund

We just finished reading, Friend or Foe! The students LOVED this read aloud book that was sent to us by our British friends. Everyday the class would quickly return from lunch and I would find them quietly sitting in the room reading their books waiting for Mrs. Larson or me to read to them. The discussions, questions, and involvement in the book was amazing! We have Googled topics like the moor, ack-ack stations, the underground, the location, and some topics related to the leaders of the countries involved in WWII. Needless to say, THANK YOU to our friends!

I’m excited to see if my class posts their thoughts/feelings about the book that ended with a round of applause. (Of course, spring break has started, so I won’t post the comments until I return to Chatham! Sorry!)

-Mr. Lund