Tag: Kate Crowder

  • Chuck E. Cheese & Math

    Chuck E. Cheese & Math

    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.

    K8

    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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  • Introducing K8 – Our Newest Writer!

    Introducing K8 – Our Newest Writer!

    Kate Crowder is the newest writer on MathFour.com. You already know her as “Daughter” – my kiddo referred to in many articles here.

    My name is Kate Crowder and I’m two years old. I know this because my mother (whom I call Taica, and you call Bon) tells me everyday.

    I repeat it and she smiles and says, “YAY!” So I’m good with saying it over and over again.

    She also tells me that two is the positive square root of four.

    I’m positive that she’s nuts, but again, she smiles when I try to repeat it, so I keep doing it. Sometimes you just have to keep the grownups happy.

    Taica and I do a lot of math. We say words like “associative” and “commutative” and talk about patterns.

    I worry about her counting though – “math” does have four letters – so I make sure to practice counting with her a lot.

    I’m the new writer!

    I’m excited about joining the writing team here at Math Is Not a Four Letter Word.

    Taica and Uncle Wil write and do videos here all the time, so I thought I could help out. Their mission is to make sure that all my friends are cool with math like I am.

    And I really am – you should hear me say “Yay math!”

    Everyone should know they’re good at math. That’s the first step in the process. If you know you do math anyway and you know you’re good at it by default, then you’ll be able to handle the stuff they throw at you in school.

    Most grownups don’t know that they already do math, though.

    And that’s where I come in.

    Taica shows me all the time where math is in our world. Whenever I eat a Vlasic Oval pickle slice, she tells me it’s an ellipse. Even grating cheese is a math discussion.

    I’ll be writing about the fun parts of my life with a mathematician mom. And you can see how my dad and I do math things too – sometimes for learning and sometimes to impress my mom, Taica.

    And maybe I can get you to see some math in your own life. And that will help you be more positive so that your kids will be as excited about math as I am.

    Yay math!

    K8

    Kate Crowder is a full time kid who can count to 20 and only miss the number 15. K8 has joined the MathFour.com team as a regular writer. Connect with her in the comments or on the contact page.

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