The Real Mac Pro

On Sunday, December 23, Mr. Billett's 6-year-old G4 stopped working once and for all.

So the next day we went to the Apple store at the Glendale Galleria, and picked up a brand new Mac Pro to replace it. The Apple store was a lot of fun - we tried the iPhone, the new iPod nano, and got expert advice from Josh, a friendly sales associate. Lucky for us, Apple offers an educational discount. The regular price for the Mac Pro is $2499, but with the educators' discount, we paid $2299.

Your job is to figure out about what percentage was our savings. It may seem complicated at first, but proportions, our good old friends, will come to the rescue. Here's how:
Here is another hint to make your job easier: You can round the total price and the sale price to the nearest hundred.

Wedding Bells

On December 22 Mr. Billett and I attended a party to celebrate our friend Tom and Lisa's marriage. Tom and Lisa live in Switzerland, where she works for the World Health Organization as a nutritionist. We bought them a gift card for $100. Your job is to find out how much this gift is worth in Switzerland, in Swiss Francs. You can use Yahoo Finance to find the exchange rate.

Story Problems

(click the picture to enlarge)

Mr. Billett found this cartoon by Lynda Barry while he was reading the paper the other day. It makes fun of math word problems by exploring their "back-story", which is the history behind a situation. I thought it was relevant because we have been solving a lot of word problems involving proportions recently. (Click here to download the handouts under homework assignments for 12/17 and 12/12.)

To receive extra credit, you can make up a problem of your own, and come up with questions about the back-story like the girl in the cartoon. If you are working on this at school, you can use Comic Life to create an additional panel for the cartoon and email it to me.

If you choose to comment on this post, select a story problem we worked on in class, and make up some back-stroy questions for it. Have fun!

Christmas Package

With the holidays fast approaching, I am sending Christmas Packages to my family and friends in Hungary. According to the United States Postal Service Website, the maximum size of a package to Hungary is as follows:

Maximum length: 42 inches

Maximum length and girth combined: 79 inches

I bought a box yesterday that measures 24in x 18in x 10in. It is the perfect size for the last package I need to ship, but is it within the size limits of the Post Office? Can I use this box?

Email me an answer (yes or no) and an explanation to get extra credit points. You may also post a comment.

Hint: the length of the package is the longest side

girth means how big it is around

Pea Soup

Yesterday I was cooking pea soup for dinner. I found a great recipe on the internet, I had all the ingredients too. The recipe was for 300 grams of peas. (I found it on a Hungarian cooking website, we use the metric system in Hungary, so we measure weight in grams, not pounds.) When I looked at the package of frozen peas I had at home, it said it has 450 grams of peas. I wanted to use the whole bag, so I had to figure out how much of the other ingredients I should use. I did it, can you? Here are the original ingredients, your job is to figure out how much of each I should use, then email me with your answers and an explanation of how you figured them out. If you decide to comment on this post, tell me something about recipes and math, or the metric system. Good luck.

Pea Soup Ingredients
300 grams peas
3 deciliters milk
30 grams butter
1 tablespoon flour
1 teaspoon sugar
1 deciliter cream
1 egg yolk

PS: The soup came out delicious, even though it looks a little funny because it's bright green.

Introduction

Hi, and welcome to Ms. Billett's math blog. The entries in this blog illustrate how math really is everywhere, and how you can't really get by without knowing your math. Each entry will contain a problem or question. You can send me an email with your answer to get extra credit points. You can also post comments, if they relate to math, you may get extra credit points for those as well. Good luck.