Fiction Texts
Scieszka, J., Smith, L. (1995). Math Curse. Viking Books.
I selected this text because it is a great way to show students that math is all around them and everything they do has to do with math. It shows students that what they learn in the math classroom is relevant and it also adds a bit of humor to the lesson.
As stated previously, I chose this book to show students how many uses math has in one's life. The main character hears his math teacher mention that math is used in just about everything you do. When he wakes up the next morning he starts seeing everything in terms of math. He ends up using algebra, statistics, probability, and other things to complete his everyday activities. At the end of the text, the curse is broken until the next day when his science teacher tells him that everything in life can be turned into a science experiment. The illustrations in this text are phenomenal and this text is appropriate for late elementary school and up. While this book is intended for students aged 9-11, it can also be used in the upper grades for it has excellent lessons and is very easy to understand.
I think I would use this book on the very first day of school to spark students' interest in math. I would do a read aloud with this book and then engage the students in discussion after. I may ask them what they found funny, what they found interesting, or to tell me something that they learned. After reading it and discussing it, I could have students do a project or a report on how they have seen math in their daily lives. Students would be required to analyze their everyday activities and describe how math is involved in those activities. This would be a good beginning-of-the-year assignment because the students would not have to solve anything but would just be forced to look at math in a different setting than just the classroom.
I selected this text because it is a great way to show students that math is all around them and everything they do has to do with math. It shows students that what they learn in the math classroom is relevant and it also adds a bit of humor to the lesson.
As stated previously, I chose this book to show students how many uses math has in one's life. The main character hears his math teacher mention that math is used in just about everything you do. When he wakes up the next morning he starts seeing everything in terms of math. He ends up using algebra, statistics, probability, and other things to complete his everyday activities. At the end of the text, the curse is broken until the next day when his science teacher tells him that everything in life can be turned into a science experiment. The illustrations in this text are phenomenal and this text is appropriate for late elementary school and up. While this book is intended for students aged 9-11, it can also be used in the upper grades for it has excellent lessons and is very easy to understand.
I think I would use this book on the very first day of school to spark students' interest in math. I would do a read aloud with this book and then engage the students in discussion after. I may ask them what they found funny, what they found interesting, or to tell me something that they learned. After reading it and discussing it, I could have students do a project or a report on how they have seen math in their daily lives. Students would be required to analyze their everyday activities and describe how math is involved in those activities. This would be a good beginning-of-the-year assignment because the students would not have to solve anything but would just be forced to look at math in a different setting than just the classroom.
Enzensberger, H.M. (1998). The Number Devil: A Mathematical Adventure. New York, NY: Henry Holt and Company.
I chose this book because it gives a new perspective to the art of mathematics. It explains math in a different way than any other book I have ever read. This is an excellent read for middle school students that enhances their reading and comprehending skills as well as their math skills.
This book takes a look inside twelve dreams of a young boy named Robert. In his dreams, a "number devil" comes and explores mathematics with him. Robert suffers from mathematical anxiety because of his boredom in school. Throughout the book, the number devil shows him different principles of math and teaches them how to use them. This book is appropriate for middle school students because it is written in terms that they understand with illustrations that help with comprehension. The text uses fictional terms for different principles (such as "garden-variety numbers" as another name for natural numbers or whole numbers). The book uses imagery to aid in getting the message across.
This book would be in my classroom library so that students could have access to it at any time they want. I would suggest to my students that if they finish a test, quiz, or assignment before the others in the class to read this text. If I did a lesson on this text, I may read aloud one dream and then base the lesson off of what the students learned during that dream then expand on that knowledge. Students could also split up into groups and be assigned a specific dream/lesson from the book. Their task would become experts on the concept presented in the chapter and teach the topic to the class with a follow-up by the teacher.
I chose this book because it gives a new perspective to the art of mathematics. It explains math in a different way than any other book I have ever read. This is an excellent read for middle school students that enhances their reading and comprehending skills as well as their math skills.
This book takes a look inside twelve dreams of a young boy named Robert. In his dreams, a "number devil" comes and explores mathematics with him. Robert suffers from mathematical anxiety because of his boredom in school. Throughout the book, the number devil shows him different principles of math and teaches them how to use them. This book is appropriate for middle school students because it is written in terms that they understand with illustrations that help with comprehension. The text uses fictional terms for different principles (such as "garden-variety numbers" as another name for natural numbers or whole numbers). The book uses imagery to aid in getting the message across.
This book would be in my classroom library so that students could have access to it at any time they want. I would suggest to my students that if they finish a test, quiz, or assignment before the others in the class to read this text. If I did a lesson on this text, I may read aloud one dream and then base the lesson off of what the students learned during that dream then expand on that knowledge. Students could also split up into groups and be assigned a specific dream/lesson from the book. Their task would become experts on the concept presented in the chapter and teach the topic to the class with a follow-up by the teacher.