| | Kiss My Math: Showing Pre-Algebra Who's Boss |
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 2008-12-22 - Problem solved
We ran across this book at Costco originally. I purchased the book with the hope that it would help my daughter's confidence with her math.
To my delight...it has and so much more. My daughter struggled with math not because she was not able to do the homework but has a mental block about math in general. This book makes math easy for GIRLS to understand and speaks to girls in their langauge and on their level with sound advice about life thrown in.
We purchased a second set of books for our friends daughter for Christmas...life changing book...!!!!
2008-12-05 - Danica helps girls with math, self-esteem, and the world
I highly recommend this book for high-school girls. It is a guide or a text in elementary algebra. What makes this book stand out is that it uses silly analogies, it explains the algebra well, it boosts the girl's self-esteem, and it is relevant to her life.
One of the first things Danika does is that she gives us the order of operations: parentheses, exponentiation and so forth, spelling the acronym PEMDAS. She calls these pandas and shows some pandas doing some math. She even expands PEMDAS into "Pandas eat mustard on dumplings and apples with spice." She makes functions into sausage factories. (for veggie sausages, let's hope). Silly analogies like this have been shown to enhance memory of things. So this would be a good book to use for studying for a test.
She explains the math well. Her use of a cutesy daisy for an unknown shows that there is nothing particularly special in alphabet letters. I like her way of dealing with word problems. Sometimes you get an equation with a large number of minus signs; this can be kind of hairy. Her remedy is to multiply everything by -1. Most textbooks say to clear complex fractions by multiplying by a common denominator, but few have this type of advice. She tells us that word problems involves English grammar as well as mathematics, and lists the mathematical equivalents for such expressions as "is less than" or "three times".
The book is not entirely about math. Math for some reason causes stress in people, including high-school girls. So she includes plenty of material on how to relieve stress. She tells girls how to deal with boys in an assertive and positive way. And she has plenty of testimonials from girls who deal with mathematics in some way.
One of her chapters is entitled "Nope, she never gets off the phone". She starts this chapter, on word problems, with a problem that has appeared in everyone's lives. There are two phone plans, which she calls Fabulous Fones ($14/month and 10 cents/min) and Happy Talk (no monthly charge and 30 cents/min) and she poses the problem of which is best. This word problem leads to an equation with a solution that tells when you should switch from one plan to the other. She shows us how to solve real world problems as well as the problems one is likely to encounter on math tests. One of the best sections of the book is a list of possible careers for women and how math is used in each.
Here are a few tips for improvement. She brings up a phrase "seven less than twice x". She tells us that this should not get a < sign because it is not a sentence. But what about the student that writes 7 - 2x? She should explain how this should be 2x - 7 instead. She brings up exponents in a few places and even has a good sidebar on how sending a kitty video to 5 people who in turn sends to 5 people can quickly reach a huge number of people. She should emphasize here that this could cause problems for web servers. Further, I would liked to have seen a section on what exponents and the exponential function mean for our world; many of today's problems are caused by exponential growth of people and material possessions.
But this is an improvement on her previous book and I highly recommend this book for young girls. She has helped bring mathematical literacy to the world.
2008-11-29 - great role model for young girls
I loved the show Wonder Years and Danica was great it it as Winnie Cooper. But it was interesting to see that she went on after that success to get a college degree in math from UCLA. These two books she has written are intended for elementary and junior high school girls to help them gain confidence in math. I think the books could be helpful to my boys as well had the come out earlier. My eldest son is in college and the younger one is in 11th grade. By the time she writes one on high school math like analysis and calculus they will both be in college. But keep it up Danica, an actress and glamour girl and a math whiz, what a amazing combination.
2008-11-20 - Kiss My Math
This may be the best math resource for the new 7th grader that is on the shelf today. Our son started 7th grade pre-algebra this year and, while he is an A student in other subjects, this brought him (and us) to our knees. Danica's book has been able to make every chapter in the school text book capable of being understood. Danica has some funny ways she gets the kids to humanize some of the more technical aspects of math, making the concept easier to relate to and to remember. Our son just finished the first trimester with a B+ and we are certain this would have been a C or less if we did not have Danica's book. This is the best $15 you will spend helping your kids in pre-algebra.
2008-11-16 - why does a celebrated actress write math books?
Danica McKellar is a beautiful actress who is probably very well off and successful. So why did she go to UCLA to study math after being a very successful child star on the wonder years and then bother to write a book entitled Math Doesn't Suck. Well it is because she wanted to prove she was more than just a good looking actress. She had a brain and could handle math. The attitude that math is not for the ladies was a horrible prejudice in my high school years and even in this enlightened age we haven't quite gotten over it and many a capable young lady lacks the confidence and courage to try to do math. Danica is a rol model who proves that they can. Her first book was so successful and helped young middle school girls overcome their fears and lkearn that math is not really hard and can be fun and interesting whenit is approached in the riht way. So math does not suck! But in addition to convincing young girls and boys that they can learn it she became encouraged to write another book based on the encouraging emails from young ladies who benefitted from the book. Well love of math should not end with middle school and algebra, geometry and calculus are very different form the kind of math you learn in the elementary and middle schools that a good series of lectures in pre-algebra is needed to help those who become discouraged again in high school. It bothers Danica to see a girlfriend of hers give up on medical school just because calculus is required. So in the same interesting style as her first book Danica interest the high schoolers with concepts like negative numbers, mathematical inequalities, exponential functions and much more. By uncovering the mysteries of pre-algebra Danica unlocks the door to advanced levels of mathematics that students in high school need. This book is good for high school teachers and anyone else with an interest in mathematics. But it is aimed at and can help most high school girls who are capable of doing well in math and nedd it for the careers they seek, like med school.
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