Students check out if getting 50% off and then a 20% discount will give them 70% off. Why does that happen?
Taking two discounts off (2 activities)
Category: Algebra
These posts help students see patterns and relationships.
The odds of horse race betting
Rich Strike surprised everyone at the Kentucky Derby horse race in early May by moving from 18th place at the half-way mark (out of 20 horses) to winning the race. Churchill Downs, the track in Kentucky where the race took place, paid out $81 for every dollar that was bet for Rich Strike to win. How do they figure that?
When will they collide?
Show the video to your class. Give students time to complain and talk about seeing this commercial. Then take guesses from students about the actual time it would take to collide.
Happy Friday the 13th!
Don’t worry, 13 is a Happy number! Students learn a new function and test whether a number is Happy or Sad. The activity: Friday-the-13th.pdf CCSS: 5.OA, 6.EE, 8.F, MP1, MP7, MP8
Shooting for Three
The NBA court has a 3-point line that separates how many points a player will earn for his team by making a basket from outside of that line. Teams have been shooting more and more three’s, but should they be and why?
Mother’s Day 2022 (14 ideas)
We have 14 possible activities for you to bring Mother’s Day into your classroom. Diapers, chocolate, Mother’s Day spending, surprise breakfast, and more …
Comedian
What do you think this activity might be about? What do you wonder? How much would you pay for this piece of art? How much profit is involved in this sale?
Earth Day 2022
We have 16 interesting activities to bring home; air quality, erosion, water levels, climate change, solar power, recycling, and changes to our Earth. Use the moment.
April 15th happenings
We have 6 April 15th activities. The Boston Marathon, Where your tax money goes, Jackie Robinson, and Paul Revere’s ride.
Passover, Spring, and Easter ideas (10 activities)
Dyeing eggs; matzoh ball soup; holiday candy sales; when to plant seeds; Peeps; macaroons; Hebrew calendar; Python tree; and giant chocolate bunnies.
How big of a crepe can you make?
At Costco you can buy this huge tub of nutella. It contains nearly 7 pounds of chocolaty-hazelnut spread. We use nutella to make banana/nutella crepes. How long will that tub last us? Is it too big and we will have…
Mental math tricks – part 2
36 x 25 = 900 480 x 25 =12,000 924 x 2.5 = 2,310 Can you see any tricks for doing these calculations in your head? The activity: ImpressYourParents-part2.pdf
April Fool’s Day fun
Try one of these 4 activities on April Fools Day. Where did that extra dollar go? Mystical Mathematical Mind Reader; perplexing missing square in the triangle; and Robert Kaplinsky’s foil prank.
Spring is here (5 activities)
To celebrate spring, we’ve shown our fractal tree coming to leaf and created in Python to see what students can figure out about the instructions of the computer language. More March Madness activities are included. An Excel activity on counting backwards to figure out planting dates. And, a reminder of tick time and the growth of Lyme disease.
What is my best gasoline option?
Should I pay the membership fee and get BJ’s gasoline? Should I just buy the cheaper gas at Sheetze? Students figure out the best deals with a membership fee, a loyalty credit card, or just the cheapest gas around. They create linear equations and find out for which amounts of gas would cost differences be the greatest and at what amount of gas would their costs be the same. And more …