Rationale: Growing up and going through junior high school and high school I don’t remember my math teachers incorporating a lot of trade books into our lessons. We used our textbook, our calculators, and A LOT of paper, but that was it. There was not really anything very engaging to our lessons. Well, except maybe getting to play with the graphing calculators. That always seemed to be a treat. The books I have chosen will benefit elementary and junior high school students more than high school, but I believe that some of the activities that go along with each book could be great learning points for high school students, particularly geometry and algebra I students.
My certification area is 7th grade through 12th grade math, so I chose books that could be used at that level, but also at a younger level as well because I do intend on eventually getting certified in those areas as well. I think it’s important for a teacher to be very flexible in subject areas or grade levels that they can teach. I also chose the books I did because they offer a variety of learning topics for math. I chose topics that cover algebra, geometry, and finance (which is very useful for consumer math in high school).
1 Title: Spaghetti
and Meatballs for All!
2 Author:
3 Illustrator:
4 Publisher: Scholastic
Press
5 Copyright: 1997
6 ISBN # 0-590-94459-2
7 Genre: Fiction
Library: Cornette Library
Summary:
In this book, Mr. and
Mrs. Comfort throw a dinner party for a family reunion. Mr. Comfort is making
his famous spaghetti and meatballs. Mrs. Comfort has set up 8 tables to
accommodate 32 guests. When guests begin arriving at the party they start
rearranging the chairs and table into one big group so that it will allow
everyone to sit together. However, as more and more guests arrive they realize
that they will have to break the chairs and tables up into smaller groups in
order for everyone to have a seat.
Personal Comments:
I
thought this was a really fun book to read and look at, the illustrations were
great. I loved that the illustrations were easy to understand because for math
purposes, it helps to be able to visualize the problem and what is happening. This
would be a great book for students ranging in age from 4th grade to
junior high age.
Suggested Use in Classroom:
After having a lesson on area and perimeter, and then reading
this book as a class, students could break up into groups to analyze area and
perimeter a little more closely. For example, they could be grouped together
and given a set of squares or tiles (to symbolize tables), and rearrange them
into groups to see how many people you could fit in different seating
arrangements. This will help students understand that shapes with the same area
can have different perimeters and vice-versa.
1 Title: Sir
Cumference and the Sword in the Cone
2 Author:
Illustrator:
4 Publisher: Charlesbridge
Publishing
5 Copyright: 2003
6 ISBN # 1-57091-601-2
7 Genre: Fiction
8 Library: Amarillo Public Library Northwest
Summary:
This book comes from a
series of other books, also containing Sir Cumference. This book is a play on
the original story of the “Sword and the Stone.” King Arthur challenges the
knights to find Edgecalibur. Sir Cumference and Lady Di of Ameter’s son,
Radius, and his friend, Vertex, venture out on the search for the sword. Throughout
their quest, they cut out 2-dimensional shapes and fold them into solid figures.
They then form a data table in order to compare the relationship between the
vertices, edges, and faces of the shapes. Vertex is finally able to uncover the
location of the sword after discovering the last two conditions in King
Arthur’s clue.
Personal Comments:
This book has great
visuals to help support the students understanding of geometrical shapes. I
like the use of math manipulatives in the classroom to aid understanding, but I
think this book would be a great supplement to a geometry lesson. I also think
this book will also be very interesting to the male gender because of the
background of the story.
Suggested Use in Classroom:
After reading the book, I think the kids would have a lot of
fun if they were allowed to go on their own quest to find Edgecalibur. They
could be placed into groups and then be given a set of clues. Another activity
would be to make my own mapping nets and have the students construct figures
from that. For older students, they could make their own mapping nets and then
construct from there. This will help guide them in their understanding of how
to use the mapping nets.
1 Title: The
King's Chessboard
2 Author:
3 Illustrator:
4 Publisher: Puffin Books
5 Copyright: 1988
6 ISBN # 0-14-054880-7
Genre: Fiction
8 Library: Cornette Library
Summary:
This tale takes place in
a palace in India. The king offers a reward to a wise man for his services. The
wise man wishes that his reward be as follows: "Tomorrow, for the first square of your
chessboard, give me one grain of rice; the next day, for the second square, two
grains of rice; the next day after that, four grains of rice; ... for
each square give me twice the number of grains as the square before
it, and so on, for every square of the chessboard." After a while of the
wise man receiving this reward, the king realizes that he has been outwitted
and that the royal granary is struggling to keep up with the constantly
increasing amount of rice.
Personal Comments:
This story is a great
lesson on exponential growth and patterns. It would be a great book to read
starting anywhere in 5th grade and on. It would be good to implement
when covering algebraic expressions also. The visuals in this book are also
wonderful and would be very interesting and appealing to the younger students.
Suggested Use in Classroom:
Students could work alone or in groups to make a chart
showing depicting how much rice the wise man received on days 1 through 12. Through
the use of the chart the students should be able to see a pattern forming. For
older groups of students or more advanced students, you could have them predict
how much rice the wise man would receive on a later day, such as day 15 or 16. This
also allows an opportunity for students to practice converting between ounces,
pounds, tons, etc..
1 Title: One Grain Of Rice: A Mathematical Folktale
2 Author:
Demi
3 Illustrator: Demi
Publisher: Scholastic Press
Copyright: 1997
ISBN # 0-590-93998-X
Genre: Fiction
Library: Cornette Library
Summary:
This book is very similar
to “The King's Chessboard.” This story is
about a girl named Rani who receives an award after a very good deed. She
requests that she receives one grain of rice, doubled each day for 30 days. In
other words, she will receive one grain of rice on day 1, 2 grains of rice on
day 2, 4 grains of rice on day 3, and so on so forth. She does this in order to
help feed her village and to hopefully outsmart the greedy raja and teach him a
valuable lesson.
Personal Comments:
I really enjoyed this
book. It provided more visuals and illustrations than “The King's Chessboard” did. It would be really easy to
incorporate with the younger students, even younger than 5th grade. It’s
a great way to introduce concepts of patterns and exponential growth.
Suggested Use in Classroom:
This book would be great to use along with “The King's Chessboard,” especially if the students are
struggling on understanding the concepts of patterns and exponential growth.
You could read this book along with the other one and do the same activities as
described earlier. The students could make charts of the amount of rice
received each day in order to analyze it and recognize patterns.
1 Title: How Much Is a Million?
2 Author:
3 Illustrator:
4 Publisher: Harper
Trophy
5 Copyright: 1985
6 ISBN # 0-688-09933-5
7 Genre: Fiction
8 Library: Cornette Library
Summary:
This book introduces the
concepts of money to the readers. It starts off depicting many different forms
of money, such as coins, cash, and checks. The book also gives examples of
equivalent forms of money. For example, 10 dimes is the same as 100 pennies, 20
nickels, 4 quarters, and 1 dollar. The book then explains the role of banks,
how checks are used, and how the banks can transfer money between individuals. Savings
and interest are also explained along with borrowing money and paying interest
back.
Personal Comments:
I think this is a great
book to introduce the concepts of money to any age group. The visuals are
intended more for elementary and junior high, but I think that high school
students could even benefit from the explanations provided throughout the book,
especially when it comes to borrowing money and the concepts of interest and
savings. I like how this book introduces real world concepts.
Suggested Use in Classroom:
For elementary students this book could be used to introduce
the basic concepts and forms of different types of money (coins, paper, etc.). The
students could then determine different equivalent amounts of money. Junior
high students could use it to start learning how to calculate interest.
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