EARTH DAY - HOORAY!
Author: Stuart J. Murphy
Illustrator: Renée Andriani
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Number of pages: 28
Publisher: HarperCollins (USA) First published in: 2004 Format: Picturebook Is the mathematical focus explicit in the story? Yes Is this story part of a mathematics story series? Yes (MathStart) Preview and/or purchase this book on the Amazon websites: UK, USA, AUS, CAN Synopsis by the author/publisher
Members of Maple Street Save-the-Planet Club are cleaning up Gilroy Park when Ryan has a brainstorm: Instead of throwing aluminum cans in the garbage, why not bring them to the Recycling Center and use the money to buy flowers to decorate the park for Earth Day? Mrs. Watson, the club's advisor, figures out that they're going to need 5,000 cans, so the kids start a big collection campaign at school. Cans are grouped in bags of 10, 100 and 1,000. Recycling facts are sprinkled throughout the illustrations. Understanding place value is key to working easily with large numbers. |
“At recess, they counted the cans. They ended up with six big bags of 100, three small bags of 10, and five single cans.”
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Official review by MathsThroughStories.org:
Stuart Murphy’s (2004) ‘Earth Day – Horray!’ is part of the impressive 63-title MathStart series. In the story, Ryan, Luke and Carly – members of the Maple Street School Save-the-Planet Club – come up with a plan to raise enough money to buy flowers for their local park, and that is to sell 5,000 used cans to the recycling centre. To help keeping track of how many cans they have already collected, they devise a strategy whereby 10 cans are put in a small bag, and 10 of those small bags of cans are put in a medium-sized bag, and 10 of those medium-sized bags are put into a very large bag. Page illustrations by Renée Andriani help young readers to see how many cans have been collected at different points throughout the story. Like the other stories in the MathStart series, useful recommendations for teachers and parents on how mathematics learning opportunities can be extended from the story are offered at the back of the book. All in all, not only does ‘Earth Day – Horray!’ provide a useful context to demonstrate how knowledge of place value can be useful to help solve everyday problems, the story also lends itself nicely to lessons on environmentalism. Recommended for children aged 7+ years old. (Disclaimer: We received a complimentary inspection copy of this book from the publisher/author)
Recommended age range:
7+ years old
Relevant mathematics topics:
Place Value
Possible teaching activities:
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