Life Is A Word Problem

By Clarence Thompson

We have reached an interesting juncture in our teaching.  Our most advanced students have become both comfortable and competent in performing the four basic operations on single and multiple-digit numbers, so we have been giving them real-world word problems to solve.  This month we had them use formulas for area to figure out the total wall area of a room, as well as the amount of paint needed to cover the walls.  In the photo, one of our kids is holding a tape measure, while his shy (but awesomely smart :)) sister hides behind the whiteboard.  The kid on the right is finding that our math curriculum stretches him far beyond what he experiences at his public school, but he likes being stretched.

Our next word problem activity involves the use of formulas to calculate the total force on a flat surface of a given area when that surface is exposed to a wind that has a certain velocity.  From that calculation we determine the maximum lift force that can be generated by a kite of a certain area.  Once we have determined this, we will build kites with the calculated area and see how much weight they can pick up.  So far we have completed all the steps except the kite-building (and kite-flying).  This last step is something the kids are all very much looking forward to!  This weekend I am drafting the write-up of our kite exercise, and I will post it on this site when it's finished. 

But as we are teaching the kids how to use mathematical reasoning to solve real-world problems, we are coming into a few problems of our own that need solving.  Therefore, at the end of May, our teaching group and our textbook writers will be taking some extended time off in order to reflect on our past accomplishments and make decisions about our future direction.  This will give us the opportunity for some focused discussions on values, strategy and motivations.  The next few posts on this blog will describe our experience with our kite project, and after that, there will probably not be any new posts for a while.  When you see us again, it may be in a different form!

P.S. Many thanks to Angela Henderson who helped write our Book 4 chapter on mathematical expressions, and who contributed problem sets to that chapter.  Many thanks also to Craig Haynes, the other author in the Book 4 project, who contributed problem sets to the word problem chapter.  Both Angela and Craig also wrote solutions to the problem sets they developed.  As soon as I have time, I will also write solutions to the problems sets I developed, and the last materials published on this blog before our break will be the Book 4 solutions from Angela, Craig and myself.