Math Stories For Problem Solving Success

This second edition of the popular math teaching resource book Math Stories for Problem Solving Success offers updated true-to-life situations designed to motivate teenagers to use math skills for solving everyday problems. The book features intriguing short stories followed by sets of problems related to the stories that are correlated to the standards of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. Each of the easy-to-read stories is followed by three increasingly difficult groups of problem sets. This makes it simple for teachers to select the appropriate problem set for students of different abilities and at different grade levels. To further enhance student involvement, the stories feature recurring characters and can be used either sequentially or out of order. The problems in the book cover many basic math topics, including decimals, fractions, and percents; measurement; geometry; data, statistics, and probability; algebra; and problem solving. In addition to having all the answers, an Answer Key at the end of the book offers explanations and background information about the problems that can be helpful to both teachers and students. Math Stories for Problem Solving Success will help you show students that math is something they are already using every day.

About This Resource ix Teaching Problem Solving Strategies x A Sample Problem xi Notes for the Teacher xii Introductory Story: Time to Go 1 1. Which Way for Jake? 3 2. The Caper 7 3. A Sigh of Relief 11 4. Future Forecast 16 5. Harper’s Surprise 22 6. Our Daily Bread 26 7. Sweet Spending 34 8. The County Fair 38 9. Square Cents 45 10. Halloween 58 11. Amazing Measurements 52 12. The Metric Airplane 57 13. Take Me to Your Liter 63 14. Give a Gram 68 15. Measurement Madness 71 16. The Invitation 74 17. On to D.C. 79 18. The Job Crisis 83 19. Tickets 87 20. Baseball—Go Figure 91 21. It’s Simply Interest 95 22. An Interesting Loan 99 23. Homecoming 103 24. Train Logic 108 25. Pendulum Project 110 26. Take a Chance 114 27. 831 Monroe Street 119 28. The Pattern Game 123 29. Unlucky Friday 127 30. Lucky Seven 131 31. Busing for Bucks 135 32. Far Out Funds 139 33. Maggie’s Secret 144 34. The Frantic Drive 149 35. Tessa’s Grounding 154 36. Geometry in the Park 160 37. String Triangles 165 38. Stop on By with Algebra 172 39. Geometry Project 177 40. A Patch for Experiments 184 41. What Is the Average? 192 42. The Challenge 197 43. It’s All in the Planning 201 44. The Pro Game 207 45. Table for Eight? 212 46. Jake’s Surprise 216 47. Model Dog Houses 221 48. A Day at Clear Lake 226 49. Survey 231 50. Summer Plans 235 51. The Dinosaurs Rock 240 52. Loop or Line? 247 53. Oregon or Bust! 251 Answer Key with Explanations 259 Selected Bibliography 291