A fun spring math and literature booklist with ideas for teaching in primary and intermediate

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1 A fun spring math and literature booklist with ideas for teaching in primary and intermediate Bean 13 by Matthew McElligott When two ants find 13 beans and try to share them, a whole series of mathematical problems result. A book for exploring prime numbers, division of the remainders, and edition with multiple addends. The History of Counting by Denise Schmandt-Besserat A beautifully illustrated book outlining the development of our number system. For intermediate classrooms. Elevator Magic by Stuart J. Murphy A young child s trip down an office building elevator is the context for this story that can easily be used for modeling subtraction at early primary. Arnie the Doughnut by Laurie Keller Arnie, a doughnut created just this morning at the bakery travels with his new owner to start his new life. He discovers to his shock that he is about to be eaten! A super fun story that can be used as a jumping off point for explorations of dozens, dozens and some more, multiplication, division, and nonroutine problem-solving. Carole

2 The Scaredy Squirrel books by Mélanie Watt Scaredy Squirrel by Mélanie Watt Scaredy Squirrel Makes a Friend by Mélanie Watts Scaredy Squirrel at the Beach by Mélanie Watts Scaredy Squirrel is afraid of everything and has developed several elaborate plans for avoiding danger. The Scaredy Squirrel series models nonfiction writing in an engaging way. These stories can be used for exploring time and elapsed time, mapping, and sequencing. The nonfiction features of this book series can be used as examples for children s own math journal entries. These books also exist in French. Mrs. McTats and Her Houseful of Cats by Alyssa Satin Capucilli In this sweet tale, children are exposed to a growing pattern, triangular numbers, and addition with sums to 26. How Many Mice? By Michael Garland 10 mice go on an adventure to collect food. They find and lose acorns and cherries, in a story that models addition and subtraction for early primary. If Mom Had Three Arms by Karyn Kaufman Orloff The illustrations in this book are great fun. The math explores a growing pattern in the context can be used for investigations of multiplication and addition. Carole

3 The Waterhole by Graeme Base This is another wonderful book by Graeme Base in which he explores environmental issues. The Waterhole, tells story of the drought and its effect on the animals of the region. The math in the book includes a decreasing pattern, beginning at 10 and ending at zero. Looking Down by Steve Jenkins This wordless book begins in outer space, and in a series of illustrations, focuses in on the city, a neighborhood, streets, a house, a front yard, and finally, on the spots on a ladybug s back. The math in this book involves notions of scale and mapping. The Number Devil - a Mathematical Adventure by Hans Magnus Enzenberger In this richly illustrated novel, 12 important mathematical concepts are described, each one the topic of a dream. Older children will love reading this novel, and exploring square numbers, probability, Pascal s triangle, and factorials. Two of Everything by Lily Toy Hong Two of Everything is a traditional Chinese folktale. It is a very funny story, in which a magic pot doubles everything that is placed in it including unsuspecting people! This story is a great jumping off point for investigations of doubling or growing patterns. Carole

4 Beep Beep Vroom Vroom by Stuart J. Murphy This is the story of a big brother and the little sister, some toy cars, and a pattern. Primary children will enjoy exploring the A B C patterns in this book, and building them on their own. When a Line Bends a Shape Begins by Rhonda Gowler Greene Circles, squares, rectangles, triangles, pentagons, ovals and other shapes are featured in this book. It provides a starting point for conversations around shapes and where they exist in the world. Jayden s Rescue by Vladimir Tumanov This novel, suitable for an intermediate aged reader, describes the adventure of three children as they try to rescue a princess, being held captive by an evil wizard. To proceed along the route, the children must answer a series of mathematical riddles that are challenging and engaging. This is a great book for a read aloud in an intermediate classroom. Whopper Cake by Karma Wilson When grandma has a birthday, grandpa makes her a cake but not just any cake, a whopper cake! Although grandma leaves him a recipe to follow, grandpa makes big changes and a whopper cake emerges. The math in this book centers around proportional reasoning and measurement. Carole

5 Flotsam by David Wiesner 365 Penguins by Jean-Luc Fromental In this wordless book, an underwater world is explored through the lens of a camera washed up on a beach. The photographs inside show children holding photographs of other children, who holding photographs of children, and so on, and so on. The math in this book focuses on magnification rate [ factors and multiples ] and notions of time [ seasons, years and decades ]. On the first day of January, there is a knock on a family s door. At the door as a deliveryman with a package. Inside the package is a penguin! Each subsequent day of the year another penguin arrives until the penguins take over the house As the family struggles to arrange and feed the penguins a great deal of math happens. This book also exists in French, with the title 365 pinguins. Hottest, Coldest, Highest, Deepest by Steve Jenkins Hilda Must be Dancing by Karma Wilson This book describes the natural world, in terms of the hottest and coldest places, the highest peaks, and the deepest valleys. Measurement and proportional reasoning are explored in this book, and there are great number of math problems to be solved using ratio and nonstandard units of measure. The language in this book is full of rhythm and rhyme. Hilda, a dancing hippopotamus, has rhythm of her own to spare and she frolics and plays in the jungle. The complex rhythms of her dances provide a context for primary age children to explore patterning. Carole

6 Biggest, Strongest, Fastest by Steve Jenkins Coined the Guinness Book of World Records for animals, this book by Steve Jenkins explores the biggest & smallest, strongest & weakest, fastest & slowest species on the planet. Each type of animal is compared through illustrations on facing pages, using a specific proportion --so the children can see their relative sizes. The math in this book involves measurement & proportional reasoning. Apples & Oranges - Going Bananas with Pairs by Sarah Pinto Sarah Pinto s book deals with attributes the ways in which things are like in a most unexpected way. You ll be surprised by her associations and your primary age children will love it! 1 Hunter by Pat Hutchins This is a classic book, with only a few words on each page the names of each of the 9 animals that sneak up on the hunter. A great counting book, it also features an increasing pattern and could be paired with Counting Crocodiles for a complementary task figuring out how many creatures are in the jungle. How Many Snails A Counting Book by Paul Giganti Jr. This is a counting book with a twist. On each of the pages, there are things to count. After counting everything in the set, the author asks children to attend to only certain parts of the set for example: How many dogs? How many dogs with spots? How many dogs with spots with their tongues hanging out? I imagine young children answering the questions in the book. I imagine older children making pages of their own deciding on the set, then creating subsets Carole

7 Wild Fibonacci Nature s Secret Code Revealed by Joy N. Hulme This is a lovely book, with a complete description of the math (for teachers!) included in the preface. The numerical pattern is revealed in the beautiful illustrations of animals around the world. The curved geometric patterns are illustrated as well A lovely way to make math-to-world connections! Full House An Invitation to Fractions by Dayle Ann Dodds This is a great read-aloud story with large colourful illustrations and a great rhyme. As the local bedand-breakfast fills up, the innkeeper notes her number of guest in fractional parts. Taking the fractions of a whole concept to another level, the guests share a cake left unattended in the kitchen! Children could extend this concept to a hotel of their own creation even mapping out the vacancy rates for a week or more, expressing them in fractions. Children could compare hotels to see whose is more popular using common denominators where necessary to sort it out Turtle Splash! Countdown at the Pond by Cathryn Falwell The turtles on the log are startled, one by one, into the pond as another inhabitant of the forest approaches. This book features Canadian animals and a rhyming pattern reminiscent of the 5 little monkeys jumping on the bed poem The math in this story of course highlights a one less than concept, but the other part to focus on is that although there may be only 7 turtles left on the log, there are 3 turtles in the water a perfect complement of ten book! Try building turtle stories in ten frames to match the events as the story is reread Carole

8 A Very Improbable Story by Edward Einhorn When Ethan wakes up there is a cat attached to his head. Yes, attached. Unlikely? Well, that s the point. The cat on his head refuses to come off until Ethan wins at a game of chance - and a series of probability lessons results This is a great book for introducing odds, the chances of things happening, and fractional representations of those odds in a variety of contexts. There are many probability experiments laid out as well that can be replicated in an intermediate class A Place for Middle by Angela McAllister One Frog Sang by Shirley Parenteau I picked up this book on a whim. It tells the sad tale of a middle child (or middle monster as is the case in this book) who feels there is no space for him. He discovers he is very wrong I see that this story could be used with small children to explore notions of measurement and ordering, and at intermediate as a soft introduction to central tendency that is, notions of the middle of a set of data, and exactly what that denotes in terms of the mean, median and mode This is a delightful counting up and down book. It s akin to Counting Crocodiles in its number pattern (increasing to ten then decreasing to zero), but the images of each set of frog allows for many conversations about number arrangements (the 8 frogs are arranged in one long line in one illustration and in 2 lines of 3 and a line of 2 in another one). Have fun with this great book! Carole