Sierra Stowell- The Grapes of Math by Greg Tang, Illustrated by Harry Briggs

1. Grapes of Math is written by Greg Tang. In this book the reader is given the task of figuring out how many of each item are shown by using symmetry to find quicker, easier ways to count. There are fish, grapes, snails, ants, camels, cherries, prairie mounds, pizzas, dice, strawberry seeds, windows, dots on a fan, scallops, watermelon seeds, insects, and bird eggs and each of these has a different, creative way of grouping items and counting them more efficiently. For example, the first thing the reader is asked to count is the number of fish in a school and instead of counting them one by one, Tang advises that you count the diagonals and you will see the fish in 4 groups of 4 so you will know that there is 16. The story continues on talking about grouping, imagining lines, and using symmetry to count in a more effective manor.

2. This book is difficult to summarize without explaining the mathematical concept, but the main mathematical concept in Grapes of Math is using symmetry to simplify counting. I discussed the school of fish example so I will move on to the grapes example. The book discusses adding numbers to make easy sums so the grapes are grouped into 5 groups of 10 and then you know that there are 50 grapes. For the snails, Tang hints that the reader should visualize what isn't there to make it easier. Since the snails are lined up you should multiply 5 by 5 and then count how many spaces are open and subtract that from 25. Next, Tang wants the reader to visual a square of the ants 4 across and 4 down making 16 and then counting the remaining ants that are not in the "square" giving a total of 19.
The next strategy is to add the humps of the camels by column instead of by row and then add those totals. The cherry example was very similar to the grapes example in that you have to group numbers together to make easy sums. For the prairie mound example the reader is supposed to pair the rows of mounds and figuring out how many mounds are in one group of mounds and then multiply that to get 27 and then count the mounds with prairie dogs and subtract that to get 23. The pizza is symmetrical so the trick is to count the mushrooms on one half and multiply it by 2 to get the total number of mushrooms on the whole pizza. The trick of the dice is to look at the rows instead of the pairs. Once you do that you will notice that there is 10 dots in each row and 4 rows making the total 40. The strawberry seeds are in a consecutive number order so they strategy is to add the first and the last together until you get to the middle and then add the middle two rows together. By doing this you will learn that it simply turns into 9 multiplied by 3 giving a total of 27 strawberry seeds. The window example is similar to the snails in that the reader should multiply the rows of the windows by the columns to get 35 and then count and subtract the unlit ones leaving 28 lit. For the dots on the fan, Tang wants the reader to focus on the rows instead of the columns making it 5 + 5 + 5 to make 15. Tang wants the reader to look for a pattern with the scallops and that pattern is to group them by 3 rows and notice that each group is the same so you count one and multiply it by 3 making 33 scallops. The watermelon seeds is just another example of finding easy sums to work with and the insects example is the same idea as the school of fish except once you have a total you just have to count the butterflies and inchworms and subtract them. Finally, the bird eggs strategy is to move eggs from the nest to make each nest have the same amount of eggs and then it is just simple multiplication to determine that there are 36 eggs. There are a few different mathematical concepts in this book, but the main one is using symmetry to group numbers and make them into easier sums.

3. Depending on the mathematical concept and the literature I do think it can be an effective way to teach/learn. For example, even though this is a children's book, I still learned ways to make counting large sums more simple than doing it one by one so this book is effective. I am not sure I think a picture book/ literature would be the best way to teach truth tables or things like that, but for the simpler things like symmetry or exponential growth I think it is an effective way. All of the books we have read in class have made an interesting way to introduce the mathematical concept we will be learning about and have been effective in teaching the bigger idea.