Math Monday: Math-e-Magic Money

Warming up on Monday with some Math-e-Magic and the wonderful (oldschool) read, The Book of Think by mathematician Marilyn Burns.

Me: "The challenge; grab a coin and a bill from your wallet."

Miss O: "Wait a minute..."

Me: "No no. You will get your money back."

(children run off and debate 

if a $5 is safer than a $10 in this instance...)

Me: "Now, balance the coin on the bill."

We often stick a cereal box between the kids as a make-shift partition.
No one likes a copycat.
It took a few minutes of fiddling about before the bills started folding.
However, I did forget that our money is no longer paper, but plastic. The results still worked out.

 

In Challenge Two, I presented two bowls to each child and asked that they create a Bill Bridge to hold the coin. They again used the folds for strength.

The Book Of Think is full of fantastic brain exercises that encourage outside-the-box thinking.

I'm now on a search for Marilyn Burns other math play books.