Newsletter 5: 101 Questions

​What's the first question that comes to your mind?The prompt above is from Dan Meyer's website, 101qs.com and it is chocked full of conversation starters between people of all ages. From Dan himself:
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"Students spend so much of their time in K-12 education being asked questions. 101questions put them in a position to ask questions. Check out the top ten list. These are the images and videos that have elicited the most questions from the most people. Ask your child what questions they have. Ask them to pick a question that math could help them answer. Ask them what information they'd need to answer it. Some of those images and videos have supplementary resources that can even help your child answer their questions. Then have your children take images and videos from their own lives that they think would provoke questions in somebody else."

In the image above, there might be a strong math discussion that comes up. Then again, there might not be. Digging through the site, there are many different types of prompts, even some in video format. So that you don't lost your favorite, make sure to bookmark the link for easy reference.

No matter the age level, these simple images elicit powerful responses. Take the image below as an example. What is the first question that comes to you? 

Here are some tips on using 101qs at home:

• The images are not the solutions, but a beginning. For the image above, I would look up texting statistics. For the image below, the life of spiders. Without those prompts, however, I wouldn't know where to begin to pique my child's curiosity.
• If the prompt doesn't evoke any emotion, skip it. Even the website itself has a "Skip it, I'm bored" button. Use it!
• Avoid doing the work for your child(ren). Rather, work through a challenging step together, taking the backseat to their creativity and innovation

Hopefully this week's Table Talk Math has your dinner table sharing ways in which math can serve a conversation.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us on Twitter (@TableTalkMath) or reply to this email.

Thank you for taking the time to improve math fluency for children, one table talk conversation at a time.