Educator Michael Strong teaches six-year-old Alana multiplication and estimation using spaghetti noodles. After Alana counts 87 noodles, Michael shows how to estimate using forkfuls: 4 noodles per fork times 20 forks equals 80. He then moves to estimating hairs on her head using the same logic.
How are you doing?
Good, how are you?
I'm well. I understand you were at a— is it a shoe conference?
I'm at a market, but we are in the booth of the shoe company.
Got it. Okay, good. Did you do the spaghetti experiment?
What did you say?
Did you do the spaghetti experiment?
Yes, I did.
And tell me, what's the result?
How many were in the bowl?
Yeah.
87.
Really?
Yeah.
Do you remember how many we estimated last week?
What did you say?
Do you remember how many we estimated last week?
Uh, not really.
Well, the reason I'm excited about 87 is that we estimated we would have about 100 noodles in a bowl of noodles.
Oh yeah, that was really close. That was really close.
It was really close. So I think you did a pretty good job. How did you count the noodles? Did you pour them in a bowl and then take them out one at a time to count them?
Yep, I took them out of the— I put the— I poured them in a bowl and then I took it out and put it on a plate and then I counted it.
And were they— was it a big bowl or a little bowl or a medium-sized bowl?
Um, kind of just like a little bowl, probably.
Okay. Um, well, I'm— now I want to try to remember how we estimated 100. Um, but I'm thinking, so yeah, it's kind of about how much space. Oh, I remember how we estimated it. I think we said that on a forkful of noodles, you might have like 3 or 4 noodles. Does that sound right? And I think you thought maybe a bowl of noodles might have like 20 or 25, you know, forkfuls. Does that sound right?
Yes.
And so do you know what 4 times 20 is?
4 times 20?
How about 4 times 2? What's 4 times 2? 4 times 2? 2?
Maybe 6 or 5?
Nope, I'm getting ahead of you because you don't know yet, yet know multiplication. Do you know what multiplication is? No. Okay, well, obviously we need to figure that out. So when we say 4 times 2, That means you do 4 plus 4, which is 2 fours. Yeah, that's 8. So 2 times 4 equals 8, just like 4 plus 4 equals 8, because 2 times 4 is just another way of saying 4 plus 4. Does that make sense? Yes. If we have 4 fingers and 4 fingers, we could say it's 4 plus 4 equals 8. Or we could say we have 4 one time and we have 4 a second time and we have 4 two times. That makes 8. It's exactly the same. Make sense?
Yes.
So 2 times 4 equals 8, and I'll give you a hint: 20 times 4 equals 80. Actually, I gave you the answer, not a hint. But does that make sense that if 2 times 4 is 8, 20 times 40 could be 20 times 4 would be 80.
Yeah, it makes sense.
So that's how I was estimating how many bowls of noodle— how many noodles were in a bowl is you think about how many forkfuls when you eat. First, how many noodles on a fork, and then how many forkfuls. Because if we got those numbers right, we'd get the right number of bowls in the noodle, right number of noodles in a bowl. And I think we did pretty well. Does that estimation make sense?
A little bit.
A little bit?
Yeah.
How about we think of a different estimation for next week? Let's see, what's something else with a whole bunch of things in a bowl or a plate or somewhere? What else do we estimate? You know what some people do? I'm thinking of something else we could estimate. You know what I mean by estimate?
Not really.
Okay, that's fine. That's totally fine. Because what estimate means is we don't know exactly But we're making kind of an educated guess. That is, we make a guess in which we know something. We don't know the whole thing, but we know something. So, you know, what we— if you really wanted to do one, we could guess, we could estimate or guess, but estimating is better. How many hairs are on your head?
Um, wait, do you mean like how many hairs are on my head?
Yep, yep. You think you have more than 2?
More than 2, definitely.
How about more than 50?
50?
Um, Okay, so you know what 100 noodles looks like because— or you know what 80— is it 87 noodles?
Yeah. Yes, he does.
Do you think you've got more than 87 hairs on your head?
8 more than 87? Yeah. Maybe I could say yes. Okay.
Do you have any idea how you would figure out? It would take a long, long, long time to count all the hairs on your head.
Yeah, right, that would take a long time.
You've got a lot of hairs. Do you have any idea how we might be able to estimate how many hairs you have on your head?
You mean guess?
Yes, but in educated. We could guess like A million, but I bet you probably don't have a million hairs on your head. That seems big.
Yeah, maybe 100, maybe again.
Well, so you saw 100 noodles in a bowl. You think that's all the hairs you have, the same number of noodles that you put onto the plate?
Maybe it could be possible.
Okay, well, because you guys are having a wonderful day out there, For now, I want you to ask your mom and dad how you might be able to figure out how many hairs are on your head, roughly, not exactly, but see if you can figure out how to, how you can know how many hairs are on your head. Or if it's easier, how about Logan? Does Logan have plenty of hair?
Yeah.
How about maybe, because it's hard for you to figure out your own hairs, How about you can estimate how many hairs Logan has on his head, okay?
Okay.
All right. In which case, I think I'm going to be offline next week, so it'll probably be 2 weeks till we talk again. And maybe then you can let me know how many hairs Logan has, okay?
Okay.
All right. Have a good day, Lana. Bye.
Bye, Michael Strong.
