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Who Sank the Boat? by Pamela Allen

Ideas for using this book in Mathematics Education in a 2nd-3rd grade classroom

The NCTM principles and standards for mathematics education Standard #7 discusses 'operation sense.' This involves both being able to apply operations such as addition and subtraction to practical situations and understanding order of operations. (www.standards.nctm.org) Pamela Allen's children's book, Who Sank the Boat?, is an excellent resource for planning a lesson that addresses this standard. Activities that could be in a lesson teaching operation sense and the order of operation (addition):

- Read the story aloud and discuss with the class who sank the boat? The children may not understand  that the mouse did not sink the boat, even though he was the last onboard before it sank. Discussion may help children see that it was the total sum of all the animals' weights that caused the boat to sink. - Divide the children into small groups or pairs and allow them to experiment with actual water play. A water table or even large plastic containers filled with water can be used with plastic bowls as 'boats.' Give each group of children a number of objects of different sizes, densities, and weights. Ask them to find five of the objects that just barely sink the boat. Have them record on paper which objects they use. Ask them to predict what would happen if they changed the order in which they placed the objects on the boat.  Then allow them to try changing the order and record on paper what happens.  In time, the children will discover that the order in which they add the objects does not matter. The mouse didn't sink the boat by himself! - As a class, discuss how this applies to adding numbers on paper.  Is it the same; do you get the same result regardless of the order you add the numbers in? Give the groups some problems on paper and allow them to discover the answer. Interdisciplinary Activities: - As a writing/art activity the children could rewrite and illustrate the book changing the order of who gets in the boat first. For example. the big cow could be last, 'sinking the boat.' Now that the children know that the order does not matter, they can chose who gets blamed. - The objects used in this lesson to sink the boats could be used in a science activity as well. If items such as cork, bolts, plastic, etc.  The children can talk about why some objects that are bigger may weigh less or float better than other smaller but heavier objects. This can be a great introduction to density!