This is a feature article by “K8” Crowder. She is the Daughter of Bon, the publisher of MathFour.com.
MawMaw & Pawpaw take my cousins and me to Chuck E. Cheese every month. We have a great time running around, playing games and riding rides. There’s not any math lessons there, per se. But Taica (my mom) always manages to get some math in there somewhere.
Every so often Chuck E. Cheese himself will come out and do a dance with a bunch of kids. Sometimes I go dance too, and sometimes I just hang back and watch.
Mawmaw says that other people “paid for” Chuck E. Cheese to come out and play. This means I shouldn’t muscle my way in and dance too. I’m not sure what that means. But it seems important to her.
Grownups “pay for” things.
Grownups get stuff from other people if they give them stuff. Taica says that’s what Mawmaw means when she says other people paid for Chuck E. Cheese.
Someone else gave Chuck E. Cheese something so he would dance with their kids. Not with me.
I got a Chuck E. Cheese t-shirt today – just like my cousin’s. Taica gave the man a bunch of pieces of paper and he gave me the shirt. Taica pointed out to me the sign on the shirts. She said it was math.
This was it:
See those numbers on the yellow sign at the bottom? They represent what one grownup has to give another grownup in order for me (or another kid) to score that shirt.
Taica said that she gave 1000 tickets for the shirt. And then she said, “That means that each ticket is the same as one penny.”
Tickets are the same as pennies? Really?
I’ve seen pennies. I like to put them in my mouth. And they do not look like tickets.
She rambled on about 9 dollars and 99 cents being mostly 10 dollars. And then if you divide 10 dollars by 1000 tickets, you get one penny per ticket.
I know that dividing means sharing your cookies with your friend. In particular, sharing so that nobody gets mad because the other kid got more. And since dividing is math, cookies are math.
I’m good with that.
But I’m not sure how sharing cookies has anything to do with tickets, pennies and shirts.
But in the end, I got my Chuck E. Cheese t-shirt.
But I still don’t believe a ticket is the same as a penny!
What do you think about this tickets and pennies thing? Do you like to give people stuff to get other stuff? Do you use tickets, pennies or something else?
Write about it below in the comments or tweet it out here:
K8 is a full time kid who can count to 20 and only miss the number 15. Her favorite songs are “A-B-C-D” and “Had a very shiny nose.” Connect with her in the comments or on Twitter at @KateCrowder.
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