If you add the hours it takes for a 16-pound thawed turkey to cook with the amount of minutes it takes four hungry teens to devour an entire pumpkin pie, and then subtract the number of times you have to walk over to the kids’ table to break up a fight during Thanksgiving dinner, what do you come up with?
In our house you get some cool holiday-inspired math activities.
Just because kids are out of school for Thanksgiving break doesn’t mean their brains shouldn’t be exercised. Turn Turkey Day into an educational opportunity by encouraging your children to partake in the some brain teasers.
Sharpen your kids’ math skills by having them compute:
A. The number of guests who ate only white meat plus the number of guests who ate only dark meat, minus the number of guests who ate a little of both.
B. If a fresh turkey should be cooked 20 minutes per pound, how long will it be before you can remove a 22-pound bird from the oven?
C. If your Thanksgiving table is filled with 12 people, and each person eats one-fourth of a pound of turkey, how large does your turkey need to be?
D. Before cutting into it, estimate the percentage of your turkey that you think is white meat and what percentage is dark meat?
E. Select your family’s favorite pie recipe. Then, have your children double the recipe and calculate the new measurements you will need for each ingredient.
Another fun math-related activity you and your children can work on together is budgeting for a Thanksgiving meal. Come up with an imaginary budget, instruct your kids to create a menu, and then shop for the ingredients without breaking the bank. You can use food prices posted online or pull out a sales flyer from the newspaper and calculate the cost of the entire holiday meal. The child who is able to prepare the most comprehensive menu without going over budget wins a new calculator… or the last piece of pie.
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