Easter Based Math

Easter is rapidly approaching and many of our students look forward to the traditional celebrations. It's always nice to be able to incorporate math that is associated with the holiday.  Again, Yummy math to the rescue with some very nice activities that are not the standard worksheet based problem.

One activity I like has students compare giant chocolate easter bunnies.  In the exercise, students make a guess as to whether the bunny is solid or hallow and must explain how they determined the choice.  They also calculate price per pound, price per inch, and height of the bunny compared to the student, based on the information provided,  Students are also asked questions such as which is better price per inch or price per pound and asked to explain why they chose the answer they did.  The activity also looks at a Guinness Book of Records bunny and ends by having students write down observations on a huge chocolate egg. 

Another activity focuses on using food coloring to color eggs. The activity has a chart at the top with instructions on the number of drops needed to color a white cake, white frosting, and to dye Easter eggs.  It begins by asking students to make observations followed by questions on the number of drops required for each.  The questions require some real thought to answer as they are higher order.  

Then there is a wonderful activity on candy sold each year.  This one has students reading and interpreting data on a pie chart concerning the amount of candy sold in a year and the percent of candy sold for various holidays such as Valentines day. They are requested to use three different methods to find answers so they don't use a calculator.  They are asked to make conclusions based on the results.

We mustn't forget the activity on Peeps, those yellow, marshmallowy, coconut covered candies one associates with easter. In this activity, students work on estimating the number of Peeps sold for easter.  At the end of the lesson, the teacher provides the number so students can compare their estimates with an official one.  

Although many of these activities are said to be for upper elementary and middle school, they can be used all the way up to high school since they work on skills that are not as frequently covered as we'd like. In addition, these are a much better thing to do than to rely on those easter worksheets that use eggs, or ducks, or rabbits with assorted operations that are nothing more than a regular worksheet disguised for the holiday.

So now you've got an instant activity to celebrate Easter, and give students practice in what they need. Let me know what you think, I'd love to hear.  Have a great day and enjoy your Easter Weekend.