Measuring Bowser: Thinking Story Book Level 2 {Real Math series]

This book aims to develop children's mathematical abilities and enthusiasm through a series of stories that (a) many children will enjoy and (b) require creative thinking about how to solve problems. The stories are designed to be read by the teacher and break frequently with questions asking the second grade students about what one might do at that point to try to solve the problem. For example, in the title story two children are trying to weigh a dog who will not sit on a scale. As they try various unsuccessful approaches, the questions ask why the ideas would not work, and how they might be improved. The authors in this book and in "How deep is the water" for first graders and "Bargains galore" for third graders have a cast of adult and child characters that are sympathetic but who consistently view the world in peculiar ways that can lead them into inferior solutions. Despite their appeal to mathematicians such as myself, the series had to be radically modified to sell, as elementary school teachers and parents were uncomfortable with the limited amount of drill. I used these books successfully to tutor my children in China for a year when they had no regular schooling, and later in volunteer weekly math "enrichment" sessions at their local school. I think they could be very valuable in home schooling or enriching standard school courses for children age 5-8, although they would have to be supplemented with some arithmetic drills.