July 4th and Math Possibilities

 Occasionally, I'd love to have math activities available to do in class when the  Social Studies teacher covers the Declaration of Independence but if you google July 4th math, you'll find a bunch of worksheets and that is not my idea of a cross curricular activity.

This is a good topic for several activities.  This site has lots of great information on July 4th that can easily be turned into an infographic.  In addition, there are pieces of information under "And the rockets red glare" that can be changed into percents.

This site features an infographic containing stats about July 4th that are not part of the previous site which students can use to interpret the information and write conclusions.  Within the infographic, there is a section on the amount of money Americans spend for food and that can easily be made into a pie graph showing the percent spent for each item.

If you want to include a reading activity, this site has some great information on hot dog eating contests, and history on the date itself.  Students can read the article and then create a summary and create an infographic to share the data.  This activity gives students a chance to take out the important information while ignoring the not so important things.

On the other hand, this site has some wonderful data including the population of the United States when the Declaration of Independence was signed and today's population, flags, fireworks, cookouts, and presidential last names.

If you wonder how many people traveled on July 4th, check this site as it breaks down the total into the number who traveled by car, airplane, or trains, boats, and railroad.  It has to be last year because the number of folks traveling this year is down due to the coronavirus.

This last site has stats on how many people hurt themselves with fireworks every year. There is both an infographic on the parts of the body most likely to be burned and the annual reports on injuries associated with fireworks from 2013 to 2019 from the United States product safety commission.  This site allows students to read and interpret data from official documents.  Students can also take the information to create their own infographics or even pie charts of the information.

When I began looking at the topic, I knew I didn't want regular worksheets because they really do not encourage students to practice reading, comprehension, writing, and interpreting data.  Most textbooks I deal with do not have any real data to interpret so these activities can help with that.  In addition, a couple of these infographics or parts of them could easily be used in a notice and wonder activity as an introduction.  One could even use the actual written data in the opening notice and wonder to perk their interest. Or maybe show three pictures, one of fireworks, one of hot dogs, and one of the flag and ask students what they notice and wonder.

I'll get back to notice and wonder possibilities on Monday but since tomorrow is July 4, I wanted to provide some possibilities to use in class once school starts.  Let me know what you think, I'd love to hear.  Have a great day.