This mini spark is all about giant pizzas. Take a look at the math involved in making a mile long pizza.

Spark your math thinking!

1. Set up your math mini spark recording page: #22:A Mile of Pizza

2. May 19, 2016:  Along the seafront of Naples in Italy, 100 chefs collaborated to create a 1,853.88 metres (6082.2 feet / 1.15 miles) long Neapolitan, which Guinness World Records confirmed is officially the Longest pizza ever made. This record was broken the following year in California.

3. Read this article to find out about all the “numbers” associated with creating the mile-long pizza in Italy!  Many of the measurements in the article are given in metric units.  Use an online conversion calculator to change any of the measurements from metric to customary. Record these on your recording page.

4. Instead of looking at a mile of pizza , let’s watch a video about a mile of Pi. One your recording page write about what challenges the the researchers faced while doing this project.

5. If you could choose to make a “mile” of your favorite food, what would it be?  What ingredients would need?  What special tools would you need to have on hand?  Write a few paragraphs about your “mile of food” and include an illustration. If you would rather write a story about your mile of food, that is great!

6. Read about other food-related world records.

• • Heaviest Ice Cream Scoop
  • Heaviest Watermelon
  • Largest Hamburger

7. Share your math mini spark recording page with your teacher/EY coordinator.

While teaching an enrichment lesson to 3rd graders a few weeks ago, one of them asked what a 13-sided figure was called.  Did you know it is a called a TRIDECAGON? Explore polygons and polygon names in this math mini spark.

Spark your math thinking!

1. Set up your math mini spark recording page: #21:Tridecagon

2. Choose 2 activities to complete this mini spark

• Watch The Greedy Triangle by Marilyn Burns.  Reading this book aloud is my  favorite ways to start a geometry unit.  After watching the video, make a recording on your recording page about your favorite shape and where it appears most often. Pick a polygon and draw 4-5 pictures of where that shape appears.

• At Math is Fun, research the names of polygons that you don’t already know and create a visual showing what you have learned.
• Create a “Geometry Around Us Presentation.”  Look at this example: as a starting point.  You can use any tool (Explain Everything, Pic Collage, Canva, etc.) and include as many vocabulary words as you like.  Try to find pictures of polygons in your school or outside.

• Write your name in block polygon letters.  Color the letters and under each one, write the correct name for each polygon.

3. Share your math mini spark recording page with your teacher/EY coordinator.

Take Me out to the Ball Game! The baseball/softball season is upon us and what better way to prepare for the fun than by studying the ways in which math is used in these fine sports.

Spark your math thinking!

1. Set up your math mini spark recording page: #20: Take Me Out to the Ball Game

2.  Watch this video about how to calculate batting average. Comment about something new you learned from the video on your recording sheet.

3. Print off this page and calculate batting averages. Worksheet Source: http://baseballhall.org/hall-of-famers/future-eligibles#2017-eligibles

4. Watch this PBS video-Real Life Math Baseball. What math does he discuss in the video? Add several ideas to your recording page.

5. Share your math mini spark recording page and batting average practice sheet with your teacher/EY coordinator.

Stretch your thinking with this math mini spark!

Spark your math thinking!

1. Set up your math mini spark recording page: #19 Exponent Exercises
2. Watch this exponent activity at Khan. Take notes on your recording page.
3. Review exponents at Math is Fun. Make a mini teaching page about exponents,  negative exponents, and what to do it the exponent is 0 or 1 on your recording sheet.
4. Practice your exponent math by playing Power Play at Transum. Pick the level that fits you. Play the level until you get a trophy. Add a picture of your trophy to your recording page.

5. Share your math mini spark recording page with your teacher/EY coordinator.

This math mini spark explores Weird But True!  Number Edition.

Spark your math thinking!

1. Set up your math mini spark recording page: #18: Weird But True! Numbers
2. Explore math facts at National Geographic Kids Weird but True! Number Edition.
3. To move from fact to fact click the arrows
4. There are 8 facts in total. Record your favorite four facts on your recording sheet.
5. Do research about each of the four topics so that you can add 3-5 more details for each one.
6. Share your math mini spark recording page with your teacher/EY coordinator.

Did you know…Among the digits of pi currently known, the concentration of each of the digits 0-9 are pretty close to equal. However, in the first 30 places of pi’s decimal expansion, there is a digit is completely missing?  Which digit is it?

Spark your math thinking!

1. Set up your math mini spark recording page: #17: Pi Numbers

2. Below you will see the first 98 digits of pi.  Record the number of times each digit appears.  Which digit is not used in the first 30 places?  Record your discovery on your recording page.

3.14159265358979323846264338327950288419716939937510582097494459230781640628620899862803482534211706

3. Take this Pi Day trivia quiz  If you use a website to find an answer, make sure to note that on your recording sheet.

4. Memorize 100,000 digits of pi using this site:  http://www.geom.uiuc.edu/~huberty/math5337/groupe/digits.html  OK…that might be a little extreme, but try to memorize at least 30 places. If you can do 30 already stretch it further.

3.141592653589793238462643383279502884197169399375105…

5. Read this article with Pi facts. Record several new ideas on your recording sheet.

6.  Discover the circles around us by posting a Circle Selfie to this Padlet Wall: http://padlet.com/spady_lynn/piday16

7.  Share your math mini spark recording page with your teacher/EY coordinator.

Circles are EVERYWHERE, and wherever there are circles, there’s math to be done!

Spark your math thinking!

1. Set up your math mini spark recording page: #16: Discover Circles
2. Read this circle fact page. Record 3-5 ideas on your recording page.
3. Find circles in your environment and snap some pictures.  Make a Pic Collage (or use another app of your choice). Add the finished project to your recording sheet.

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4. Get a ruler. Snap a picture of a circle that you have found with a ruler going through the center This is measuring the diameter of the circle.  Calculate the circumference of the circle by taking pi (3.14) times diameter.  C = πd. Record your math and the answer on your recording page
5. Read the following steps to see how you can get to Pi!

Step 1:  Measure the diameter of a circle.  I used the top of my QT cup in the picture below. I measured the diameter as 11.5 cm.

Step 2:  Measure the outside of the circle (circumference) with a string (I used a piece of making tape folded in half because I didn’t have a string handy).

Step 3:  Measure the string.  I measured the circumference of my QT lid as 36.5 cm.

Step 4:  Divide the circumference by the diameter (36.5 divided by 11.5).

I got 3.17391304.  Not too bad!

5. Do steps 1-4 with your own circle. Record all of the math on your recording page.

6. Share your math mini spark recording page with your teacher/EY coordinator.

Learn about how Pi relates to cylinders, cones, and spheres in this math mini spark.

Spark your math thinking!

1. Set up your math mini spark recording page: #15: Spheres with Pi
2. Watch this video. Practice drawing the sphere with the teacher on your recording page. Record 3-5 other details from the video.

3.  Read about cylinders, cones, and spheres. Answer the questions the show up as ????  with a blue background and keep moving along the teaching journey.

4. Read this teaching page that shows how to calculate the surface area of a sphere. Record the steps on your recording sheet.

5. Share your math mini spark recording page with your teacher/EY coordinator.

10 squared = 100

The number of centimeters in a meter = 100

The number of sides on a square multiplied by the quantity of the number of letters in the alphabet take away one = 100

55+45 = 100

The base 10 equivalent of this binary number:  1100100 = 100

Spark your math thinking!

1. Set up your math mini spark recording page: #14: 100

2. Choose one of these projects to earn this mini spark.

• Come up with 100 facts about the number 100. You can include math problems (like the ones listed above)
• Facts that include the number 100
• How to say 100 in different languages
• Learn the scientific names of 100 animals.  Use this site (or another research tool) and present your learning using a tool of your choice (a list on paper, a Keynote, Pic Collage, etc.). Flip a coin 100 times and record the number of heads and tails.  Summarize your results.
• Write a 100 word story about what you think life will be like 100 years from now.
• Research information about life 100 years ago.  This article has some information about how things have changed. You may need to do other research Make a NOW VS THEN chart on your recording page. Compare/Contrast this year to what it was like 100 years ago. Include at least 10 items in your chart.

3. Share your math mini spark recording page with your teacher/EY coordinator.

One of my favorite pictures books is A Million Dots by Andrew Clements. This book provide readers with several different ways to visualize a million.  This math mini spark asks you to explore this fascinating number!

Spark your math thinking!

1. Set up your math mini spark recording page: #13: Mad About a Million

2. A Million Dots by Andrew Clements is a book that actually has 1,000,000 dots in it (along with many other fascinating facts!).  One million dots my seem kind of hard to imagine, but check out the book and see for yourself.

3. Watch The Making of Hero, a drawing composed entirely out of 3.2 million ink dots. Write your reaction to the final project on your recording page.

4. Do a little experimenting with stippling.  Try the activity shown in this video. Add a picture of your work to your recording page.

5. Figure out a problem involving a million.  Show your work and reasoning for your answer on your recording page.

• • • How tall would a stack of one million pennies be?
    • If your leaky faucet dripped one million drops, how much wasted water would that be?
    • How long would it take you to count from 1 to 1,000,000 assuming that you counted one number every second for 8 hours a day?
    • How old would you be if you lived for 1,000,000 minutes?
    • How long will it take for your blink one million times?
    • Come up with your own “million problem”

6. Share your math mini spark recording page with your teacher/EY coordinator.