In today’s MathStratChat, Pam and Kim discuss the MathStratChat problem shared on social media on May 1, 2024.
Note: It’s more fun if you try to solve the problem, share it on social media, comment on others strategies, before you listen to Pam and Kim’s strategies.
Check out #MathStratChat on your favorite social media site and join in the conversation.
Twitter: @PWHarris
Instagram: Pam Harris_math
Facebook: Pam Harris, author, mathematics education
Want more? Check out the archive of all of our #MathStratChat posts!
Pam 00:00
Hey, fellow mathers! Welcome to the podcast where Math is Figure-Out-Able! I'm Pam.
Kim 00:06
And I'm Kim.
Pam 00:07
And this episode is a MathStratChat episode where we chat about our math strategies. Every Wednesday evening, I throw out a math problem on social media, and people from around the world chat about the strategies they use, and comment on each other's thinking.
Kim 00:19
Okay, so this Wednesday, the problem that you threw out on Facebook, and Twitter, and Instagram was... I wrote it down. two-thirds of 12. How would you guys solve this problem? Pause the podcast. Solve it any way you want. The problem is two-thirds of 12.
Pam 00:39
Cool.
Kim 00:40
Okay, I'm going to go first because I remember what you did last week, and I liked it.
Pam 00:43
Okay.
Kim 00:44
Because it is kind of a strategy that I adore. So, if we knew that three-thirds of 12 was 12. That's like the whole amount. Then, I could think about one-third of 12, which is 4. And I could say three-thirds minus one-third. So, 8 minus 4... Sorry, 12 minus 4 is 8. So, two-thirds of 12 is 8.
Pam 01:12
Cool. And I'll do what you did last week. I'll think about one-third of 12 kind of like you just did. And I'm going to actually talk about how I think about one-third of 12. One-third of 12, I have to partition 12 into 3 equal chunks. And so, 12 divided by 3. Therefore, one-third of 12 is 12 divided by 3, which is 4. And I need 2 of those one-thirds. Two 4s is 8.
Kim 01:35
Yeah. You know, why is it that in school we tell kids to... We don't. But kids are taught to do 2 times 12 divided by 3.
Pam 01:47
Yeah.
Kim 01:47
It just makes so much more sense to me that you would think about a third of something and know that two-thirds is two 1/3s, so you would double that something.
Pam 01:57
Yeah.
Kim 01:57
Why is that?
Pam 01:58
Yeah, because we learned math as fake math, but we were just supposed to mimic stuff. And teachers want a general procedure that works for any fraction multiplication problem. But we're suggesting that's not the way mathers think. Mathers actually think about the numbers given the particular problem, and they use what they know to solve it. Just like we just did. Yes. Alright.
Kim 02:21
Alright, so we can't wait to hear what you do. Join us on MathStratChat. And let us know how you think about the problems each week. And we love it when you comment on other people's strategies like I know you love it when we comment on yours.
Pam 02:34
Absolutely. And we'll post the problems Wednesdays at 7pm Central Time. And when you answer tag me, and use the hashtag MathStratChat. And then like Kim said, comment on other strategies. Then join us here to hear how we're thinking about the problem. Ya'll, thanks for making math more and more figure-out-able.
