Math Concept Reader MCR g3 a nose for news and numbers

Math Concept Reader
A Nose for News
and Numbers
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Math Concept Reader
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ISBN 13: 978-0-15-360179-8
ISBN 10: 0-15-360179-5
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 179 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 07
Math Concept Reader
by Linda Bussell
A Nose for News
and Numbers
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Sarah reads the Sunday paper aloud. She is a
reporter for her school paper. She is always looking for
new story ideas.
This morning she r
eads an article about national
parks. The parks belong to the people of the United
States.
They pr
otect natural ar
eas and wild animals. Anyone
can visit a national park. Sarah’s mom says that she
once visited Y
ellowstone National Park.
Y
ellowstone contains nearly 60% of the world’s
geysers. A geyser is a spring that occasionally shoots
water and steam into the air
. The most famous geyser
ther
e is called Old Faithful. Sarah decides to write an
article about national parks.
2
Chapter 1:
Numbers
and Mountain Math
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SEQUOIA
YOSEMITE
VOLCANOES

CUYAHOGA
Sarah reads more. She learns that Yellowstone was
the first national park. President Ulysses S. Grant set
the land aside in 1872. It is located in three states–
Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho.
Sequoia and Y
osemite in California became national
parks in 1890. The General Sherman T
ree in Sequoia
is the world’s largest and reaches 275 feet above the
ground!
Hawaii’s Volcanoes National Park is home to Kilauea,
one of the world’s most active volcanoes! It became a
park in 1916.
O
h
io’s Cuyahoga Valley became a national park in
2000.
3
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Sarah makes a timeline, which is a number line
with dates. She will place dates in order while her
brother Gabe reads aloud.
Mammoth Cave National Park in Kentucky
became a park in 1941. Mammoth Cave is the
world’
s lar
gest known cave system and covers more
than 400 square miles.

Colorado’s Rocky Mountain National Park was
established in 1915 and contains 150 lakes and 450
miles of str
eams.
Florida’
s Biscayne National Park became a park in
1980. This park is home to the Florida Keys, which
ar
e a chain of islands.
4
1850 1860 1870 1880 1890 1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Yellowstone 1872
Sequoia 1890
Yosemite 1890
Founding Dates of National Parks
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Sarah draws a line. She puts a mark for every ten
years on it. She writes the years above the marks.
The line runs from 1850 to 2000.
She places a five-year mark halfway between the
ten-year marks.
Sarah enters the dates on her timeline. Wher
e
should she put the year 1872? It is between 1870
and 1875. Sarah makes a mark. She labels it
“Y
ellowstone 1872.”

She marks Y
osemite and Sequoia on the timeline.
They are both at 1890.
5
1850 1860 1870 1880 1890 1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Sarah creates a timeline and marks the years that
two national parks were founded.
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Gabe looks closely at the timeline. He notices
that the digits for Biscayne, Yosemite, and Sequoia
are the same.
Sarah takes a look and then nods. Then she
notices that the place value of the digits 8 and 9 is
switched. This makes a dif
fer
ence in the number’s
value.
Biscayne became a national park in 1980, not
1890. The tens and hundr
eds digits ar
e reversed.
Gabe says 1980 is 90 years after 1890. He writes:
1890 + 90 = 1980
6
1850 1860 1870 1880 1890 1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

Yellowstone 1872
Sequoia 1890
Yosemite 1890
Founding Dates of National Parks
Rocky
Mountain
1915
Hawaii
Volcanoes
1916
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Sarah finishes her timeline. Gabe says the article
needs pictures and offers to help find them. He will
look for photographs of the parks in Sarah’s article.
Sarah looks at the newspaper article again. She
turns the page to the next section. This section is
called “T
all Peaks” and is about mountains in the
national parks.
She r
eads that the tallest mountain in North
America is Mount McKinley
. It is 20,320 feet tall.
Mount McKinley is in Alaska’s Denali National Park.
7
1850 1860 1870 1880 1890 1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Mammoth Cave 1941 Biscayne 1980

Cuyahoga Valley
2000
Sarah adds more dates to her timeline, for a
total of eight national parks.
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Sarah reads about more tall mountains. Mauna
Kea is in the Hawaii Volcanoes Park and is 13,796
feet tall. Measured from its base on the ocean floor,
though, Mauna Kea is the tallest mountain on Earth!
Grand Teton is in Grand Teton National Park in
Wyoming. It is 13,770 feet tall.
Mount Whitney is in Sequoia National Park in
California. It is 14,491 feet tall.
Sarah wants to write about and compar
e the
mountains. She draws a table of the mountain
heights.
8
Measured from its base at the ocean floor,
Mauna Kea in Hawaii’s Volcanoes National
Park is the tallest mountain in the world.
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Sarah orders the heights of the mountains. She
starts with the ten thousands place. She can tell that
Mount McKinley is tallest since it has a 2 in the ten
thousands place. The other mountain heights have a
1 in the ten thousands place.
Sarah compar

es the thousands place of the
mountain heights, and then she compar
es the
hundreds place. She puts the mountains in order
from tallest to shortest. They are Mount McKinley,
Mount Whitney, Mauna Kea, and Grand Teton.
9
Heights of Mountains
in National Parks
Mountain Name Height
Mount McKinley 20,320 feet
Mount Whitney 14,491 feet
Mauna Kea 13,796 feet
Grand Teton 13,770 feet
Sarah orders the heights of
mountains in a table.
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Sarah wants to do more research so she, Gabe and
their mom walk to the neighborhood library. They use
computers there to search the Internet for information
about national parks. They also find books about national
parks.
Sarah wants to find other things to compare in the
national parks. On the National Park Service Web site,
Sarah reads about Yosemite National Park. She learns
that Yosemite Falls is the tallest waterfall in North
America. However, it is only the fifth tallest waterfall in
the world.
Sarah decides to write about the famous waterfalls

in Y
osemite.
Yosemite Falls 2,425 feet
Bridalveil Fall 620 feet
Nevada Fall 594 feet
Ribbon Fall 1,612 feet
Height of Waterfalls
10
Chapter 2:
Tall Waterfalls and
Counting Creatures
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Sarah wants to make a table that will show the
waterfalls in Yosemite in order by height.
“A bar graph would be easier to read,” says Gabe.
“It is better for comparing the heights. It will be
easier to draw if we r
ound the numbers.”
Sarah discovers that if she r
ounds the heights to
the hundreds place, it looks like Bridalveil and Nevada
Falls are both 600 feet high. If she rounds to the tens
place, the differences will show.
11
Height in Feet
(Rounded to Nearest 10)
Height of Waterfalls in
Yosemite National Park
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

500
1000
1500
2000
2500
3000
Yosemite Falls
About 2,430 feet
Ribbon Fall
About 1,610 feet
Bridalveil Fall
About 620 feet
Nevada Fall
About 590 feet
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Finally, they look for information about wildlife.
They read that Maine’s Acadia National Park has 326
kinds of birds. It has 41 kinds of mammals and 28
kinds of fish. That is 395 kinds of animals in all. They
round to the nearest 100. That’s about 400 different
kinds.
Rocky Mountain National Park has 276 kinds of
bir
ds. It has 56 kinds of mammals and 7 kinds of fish.
That is 339 kinds of animals in all. They r
ound to the
nearest 10. That’s about 340 different kinds.
12
National parks are home to many

kinds of birds, fish, and mammals.
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FISH
MAMMALS
BIRDS
ROCKY MOUNTAIN
ACADIA
Sarah and Gabe make a bar graph that shows the
numbers of different kinds of birds, mammals, and
fish. They can use the graph to compare. It compares
the numbers of animals in Acadia National Park to
Rocky Mountain National Park.
Sarah makes a bar on the graph for each kind of
animal in each park. Gabe wants to show the total
number of dif
fer
ent animals in each park.
Sarah thinks that readers will figure this out. They
can use data from the graph.
13
Kinds of Animals in Acadia and
Rocky Mountain National Parks
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350
7
28
56
41
276
326

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Sarah, Gabe, and their mom return home from the
library. They have done several hours of research and
are excited about all they have learned. They help get
dinner ready together while they talk about Sarah’s
article.
Sarah has enough information to begin writing. She
has collected facts and information about 11 dif
fer
ent
national parks.
She says she will call her article “National Parks by
the Numbers.” Gabe says this is a good title since the
article has lots of numbers in it.
14
Chapter 3:
Read All
About It!
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Sarah organizes her article. She chooses which
facts and information she wants to include. She
orders and r
ounds numbers. Ordering and rounding
numbers makes it easier for readers to understand
the facts.
After dinner
, Sarah sketches a pictur
e of what the

article will look like. She draws rectangles where the
tables, graphs, and photos will go. Gabe draws maps
and pictur
es of animals.
Mom finds a pictur
e of Yellowstone to use. The
whole family agrees that the article will be Sarah’s
best yet.
15
Sarah’s brother and mother help her finish
her article. It is her best one yet!
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16
Photo credits: cover, title page, pp. 3 (bottom center), 15 Russell Pickering; pp. 3 (top left, middle left),
4, 5 (both), 6, 7 (both), 9, 13 (middle) National Park Service; p. 3 (bottom left) courtesy of MODIS Rapid
Response Project at NASA/GSFC; p. 3 (right) © Kayte M. Deioma/Photo Edit; p. 8 NOAA; pp. 12 (left),
13 (top) U.S. Department of Agriculture; p. 12 (top right, bottom right) National Biological Information
Infrastructure.
Glossary
order to arrange according to a rule
place value the value of each digit in a number,
based on the location of the digit
r
ound
to replace a number with another number
that tells about how many or how much
timeline a number line with dates
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Think and Respond
1. Use the timeline on pages 6 and 7. Bryce Canyon National
Park was established in 1928. Suppose you wanted to add
Bryce Canyon to the timeline. Where would you place it?
2. Cuyahoga Valley National Park in Ohio has 239 birds.
What digit is in the tens place?
3. Place these mountains in order from shortest to tallest.
Make a table like the one below
.
Cathedral Rock, 10,911 feet
El Capitan, 7,569 feet
Half Dome, 8,836 feet
Lembert Dome, 9,450 feet
Mountains of Y
osemite National Park
4.
Look at the table you made for Question 3. Suppose you
wanted to round the numbers for a newspaper article
about mountains. Which place would you round the
numbers to? Why?
Mountain Height in
Name Feet
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