Write the word carrot inside your math text book. Do not show students.
When Mathspig was a mathspiglet we used to play this trick. It doesn’t work on everyone, but it works often enough.
Ask a student to say 15 times 15 fifteen times.
Then ask them to name a vegetable. Students say carrot 90% (I’m guessing) of the time.
To make this trick more dramatic send 10 students out of the class before you begin and tell the other half what you are about to do. Students return one at a time. How often do they say ‘carrot’? What % of students say carrot?
In every volcano disaster movie from Volcano (1997) with Tommy Lee Jones to Dante’s Peak (1997) with Pierce Brosnan someone somewhere tries to out run a lava flow.
Is this possible? (See movie cliché busted by maths here.)
Now a lava flow from Hawaii’s Kilauea volcano is threatening tiny town of Pahoa, Hawaii again. (below).
You will find excellent information about the Kilauea and other volcanoes at the
As the temperature of lava exceeds 10000 C there are very few ways to stop lava. According to the Taylor Kate Brown SMH (10 SEPT 2014) options include:
Bombing
Blasting (it with cold water)
Barricading it
Or adding concrete.
What if you are on your own.
Can you out run lava?
Lets do the maths.
Lava from Kilauea travels 17 yards per hour so the lava velocity is:
Students doing repetitive text book exercises without using maths to solve REAL WORLD problems.
The Solution:
You are going to use this maths NOW…………………..
……………………………………………………………………………….
How much blood can YOU lose and survive?
………….METRIC UNITS
Remember the best calculator to use is the WEB 2.0 Calculator as it shows the worked equation as you go.
CAREERS: It’s not only health workers who need to understand these calculations, but also creatives running health campaigns online, on TV, radio and in magazines.
TOPICS: Decimals, %, algebra, vol, weight units (METRIC)
Students doing repetitive text book exercises without using maths to solve REAL WORLD problems.
The Solution:
You are going to use this maths NOW…………………..
……………………………………………………………………………….
How much blood can YOU lose and survive?
………….USA Units
Remember the best calculator to use is the WEB 2.0 Calculator as it shows the worked equation as you go.
CAREERS: It’s not only health workers who need to understand these calculations, but also creatives running health campaigns online, on TV, radio and in magazines.
TOPICS: Decimals, %, algebra, vol, weight units (USA UNITS)
