Poetry for Children 5903-23
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Poetry Break 17

A poem relevant to mathematics

math.jpg
Available from www.Amazon.com. Accessed July 17, 2005

Who Hasn't Played Gazintas?
by David McCord
 
 
In your arithmetics
the problem is what sticks.
The language isn't  bound
by spelling , but by sound.
So 3 gazinta 81.
The answer? 27. Done!
In long division, I would hint, a
lot of work gazin gazinta.
 
Then Tums: the sign of which is x.
Do 8 tums 1-5-6? It checks
at just one thousand two four eight.
Repeat: 1,248.
 
Computers work at a faster rate.
 
Hopkins, Lee Bennett.1997. Marvelous Math.
     New York: Simon & Schuster Books for Young
      Readers

Introduction
The bold colors of this book are really striking.
Tell the class that sometimes people  have different ways of doing math work.
 
Expansion
Read the poem to the class see if they can figure out what a gazinta and a tum are. Have them make up their own way to teach multiplication or division. When they finish they can give the problem to a classmate to solve.

A poem relevant to science