Tuesday, September 22, 2020 at 13:30 UTC (which is the same as 9:30 am EST), will be the Autumnal Equinox. It is the time of year when the imaginary plane that passes through the Earth’s Equator would also travel through the…
Fall Equinox 2020
Tag: 5th
Extreme weather 2020
Use the open number line and our lists of temperature extremes to make signed number operations and absolute value sensible. Students compare record high and low temps (integers) and use absolute value in order to always find the positive difference. Subtraction of negatives becomes obvious in this lesson.
Labor Day 2020
What is this holiday about? Are we celebrating the start of school? New cars? The end of summer? In this short activity, students learn about the intended meaning of Labor Day as they read about its origin. For the mathematical…
USPS needs help!
Students learn how the Postal Service is funded and try to decide how the USPS could earn more or spend less in their operation. They finally get to think about whether the post office should be a government run service or a self-sustaining business.
What will supplies costs this year for going back to school?
Back to school spending is huge and students might not appreciate what it costs to send them back to, essentially, their job of learning. In this activity students decide what equipment and supplies are necessary, estimate how much that will…
Ramen noodle heist
In 2018, the trailer of a truck filled with Ramen noodles was stolen from a parking lot in Georgia. The trailer contents were valued at $98,000. What do you wonder about this? Is this even possible?
Could $98,000 worth of Ramen even fit in a tractor trailer?
Do you want to be an NBA virtual fan?
For health concerns, professional sports now have no actual live fans. To help generate the excitement and semblance of fans, some teams use cardboard cutouts of people. Some use Zoom screens of fans. The NBA creates virtual fans. Actual viewers…
How big is this hornet really?
Giant hornets have now migrated to North America. In this activity students take the hornet’s measurements in millimeters and try to draw the hornet, life-sized, on centimeter graph paper. They learn a little more about the new beast.
It might be a good year to see the Perseid meteor shower
Catching a productive meteor shower can be a stunning experience. On the evenings and mornings of August 11th, 12th and 13th there could be a very good show. A last quarter moon will leave the night sky growing darker each…
Largest s’more ever!
What is reasonable.? How many marshmallows are in this recipe? How many people could this cookie feed? How many marshmallows could you eat?
What does the data show?
When you look at the new case numbers of the Coronavirus in the U.S. and compare that with various world and national events and our present scientific understandings, what do you wonder? What can you deduce? What might the future…
How much water should you be drinking?
Does the new “Most Stuf” Oreo have an exorbitant amount of stuf?
How much more “stufed” are they compared to Triple Double Oreos, Double Stuf Oreos or even Original Oreos. Does this look yummy to you or gross? Why are they filled with creme and not cream? Maybe Nabisco’s employees can’t spell. What do you think?
Betsy Ross’s 5-pointed star + 4th of July activities
3 activities for the Fourth of July: (1) Folding analysis to make a 5-pointed star; (2) Parabola manipulation to create a fireworks image on your calculator; and (3) Ratios, creativity, and art in creating new flag patterns.
National Donut Day
Two activities to help celebrate National Donut Day
How many donuts is that = huge box of donuts to approximate.
How have donuts changed = torus volume measurements, formula intuition, and algebraic transformation of one formula into a second formula.