Monday Math Literature: The Mitten Story Problems

Happy Monday!  Yesterday, in my post about our book study on Children's Mathematics, I mentioned that I loved one of the review questions from Chapter 4 that suggested looking at a book or a unit of study you are working on and writing some story problems based on that book or unit.  I thought this was a great idea and will be posting my problems and books for the next few weeks as part of my Monday Math Literature series.  If you haven't read Children's Mathematics, they make some great arguments for exposing primary students to multiplication and division story problems as a way to build their understanding of place value.  Today I wrote some problems to go along with a treasured favorite in the primary grades.

The Mitten

It is hard to believe this book is celebrating its 20th anniversary!  It is a wonderful adaption of a Ukrainian folk tale.  If you haven't read it, you should definitely check it out!  If you use this book with your students already, here are some math story problems you could pose as a follow up.  One of these problems is a multiplication problem, one is a partitive division problem and two of them are measurement division problems.  If you don't know about these different types of problems and why they are important for primary students to be exposed to, check out the Children's Mathematics book study. 

You can grab these problems for free from Google Drive

Remember that problem solving is a process.  The range of solutions you will see will depend on where your students are on the problem solving progression.  If you don't see a range of strategies, these problems might be to hard or to easy for your students. 

Your turn!  What math story problem would you write for your students based on The Mitten?  Please respond in the comments below or head over to Facebook to share your idea!