A Collection for Kate

This book and series are great! An interesting story, great pictures and good ideas about using math in our everyday life.

A Collection for Kate is one of a series of books in the Math Matters collection. Each Math Matters book looks at one concept and features a character with a predicament to be solved. About the book Written in 1999 by Barbara de Rubertis and illustrated by Gioia Fiammenghi, this 32-page book was published by Kane Press. It is for children ages 5-7 or kindergarten through 2nd grade. The math concept in A Collection for Kate is addition. The story The setting for this book is Kate's classroom. The children signed up to bring in a collection and share it with their classmates. Kate had less than one week in which to come up with a collection. Kate went home and rummaged through all her things. She had "a little of this. She had a little of that." But she didn't have enough of anything to make a collection. She wasn't even sure how many things made up a collection so she decided to see what the other kids would bring. On each day a different child brings in his or her collection and talks about it. Joseph had 2 tote bags with books. Nine books were about snakes and 5 were about lizards. Kate added that up and it came to 14, which sounded like a lot to her. The book continues with the children bringing in their collections: one child collected 2 kinds of magnets - 13 animal magnets and 11 food magnets. Kate was really worried because that added up to 24! Kate went home and looked again but couldn't come up with a large collection. The book continues with many children sharing their collections, counting them out and Kate adding up the numbers. In some cases it was more than 2 numbers; some she had to add a row of 3 numbers. One child had so many types of pigs (glass, plastic) that Kate had to regroup to find the sum. (For those of you who learned math like I did - the old-fashioned way and don't teach, regrouping is the new way that math is taught. Rather than carrying for addition or borrowing for subtraction, children regroup.) Kate ended up coming with a very creative collection to share with the children that they all though was "cool" and "a great idea." Her teacher commented on her collection and Kate answered, "Right...for me that just didn't add up." The illustrations: This is a very cute book and the pictures are adorable. The children look real. They are all sizes and colors with a variety of expressions on them. The pictures aren't intricate. They are simple faces, for example with a line for a nose and in some cases the faces don't have eyes. It adds to the appeal of the book as a children's book - one just to have fun with and not take too seriously. They are colorful and detailed when necessary. When Ben shows his shell collection, the shells are shaped like shells and in a box labeled with different states on them. What your child will learn The point of the book is achieved and achieved well. The point is to have a child read the story and get drawn into it so that he or she doesn't even know he is doing math. You will find two importa