This Week From Bedtime Math: Eggheads
What is Bedtime Math? A message from Laura: Bedtime Math is a pretty simple idea: We all know we should read to our kids at night, but what about math? My husband and I have done fun, mischief-loaded math problems with our kids at night for years, and when at age 2 our third child started hollering for his own math problem, we realized we were onto something: In a world where so many people say, "Ewww, math!" we had created a household culture where kids don't just tolerate math, they actually seek it out. Now we email parents a fun, lively math problem every day to do with their kids – and every week, we'll be posting a new problem right here on Scholastic Parents!
When people have a lot of free time on their hands, sometimes they come up with strange ways to keep busy – like breaking the world record for smashing eggs with their foreheads. That's what Scott Damerow did when he successfully smashed 142 eggs with his head in just 1 minute. Wow! As you can see from this video, this is messy business, but he must have decided it was worth the fame. The thing is, it does take a lot of effort. An eggshell is very strong: you have to put over 5 1/2 pounds of pressure on the side to break it, and it can handle up to 40 pounds if you press the ends or evenly across the whole shell. Scott might not have made much more than a mess, but clearly he did a lot of work.
With that in mind, see if your kids can crack these egg-inspired math challenges:
Wee ones: If you are baking with 6 eggs and crack 4 of them with your head, how many are left to crack the normal way?
Little kids: 142 eggs is a lot…what would be the next even number of eggs Scott could have cracked? Bonus: What's the next multiple of 10?
Big kids: Scott smashed these eggs in 1 minute. How many more did he crack than if he'd just puttered along smashing 1 egg per second? Bonus: How many more than if he'd smashed 2 eggs per second?
Wee ones: 2 eggs left.
Little kids: 144 eggs. Bonus: 150 eggs.
Big kids: 82 more eggs. Bonus: 22 more eggs.