Using poetry to find the math all around us

Instructor, April, 1997 by Bee Cullinan

Math is everywhere. We use it when we write a check, follow a recipe, or calculate the tip in a restaurant. Get your students thinking about how they use math every day with Joy Hulme's poem, "Divvy Up."

PRIMARY Activity

WRITING ABOUT MATH

PURPOSE

Connect students to everyday math with an activity that has them evenly dividing a quantity by hand.

MATERIALS

copy of Joy Hulme's "Divvy Up" on page 23; dried beans or math manipulatives

TIME NEEDED

1 hour

1 Read aloud Joy Hulme's poem "Divvy Up."

2 Ask students to name any synonyms for divvy up. List their answers, which might include divide and split up, on the board.

3 Point out that the poem shows one way to divide a bag of beans. Ask your students if they can think of other ways to divide things equally. You might have students talk about times they've had to split a treat with a sibling or a friend, and how they did it.

4 Hand out bags of beans (or dry pasta, plastic manipulatives, or jelly beans) to give your students a chance to do their own divvy-ing up. Have students work with a partner to try different ways of dividing the bean sevenly into two piles. They might also try dividing them three or four ways.

5 Once the partners have figured out the best way to divide the beans in half, have them work together to write a poem describing how they did it. Students can start by simply writing down a few sentences explaining their method. Then, using the Hulme poem as a model, they can write their own version of "Divvy Up."

6 As a follow-up, read Pat Hutchins's The Doorbell Rang (Greenwillow, 1986), in which the characters must evenly divide up cookies as unexpected guests arrive.

MORE MATH-BASED WRITING ACTIVITIES

* Have students write verses about what different numerals mean to them. For example, 1 stands straight and tall, proud to be first, or 8 is a snowman. They can illustrate the ideas, too.

* As a class, brainstorm all places you can find or use math, such as a ball game or a store.

* Students can try writing riddle word problems for classmates to solve.

DR. BERNICE "BEE" CULLINAN, professor of reading at New York University's School of Education, is the author of many books, including Three Voices: An Invitation to Poetry Across the Curriculum (with M. Scala and G. Schroder; Stenhouse, 1995), and is the editor-in-chief of Wordsong, the poetry imprint of Boyds Mill Press.