Fruity Arrays

Math is everywhere! Our nutrition program at my school requires each kiddo to get a fruit even if they don’t plan on eating it. So instead of throwing it away, they give it to me. In the afternoon, I draw numbers from my equity sticks to see who gets the fruit of the day.

It seems like every day I walk out of the lunchroom holding an armful of fruit. I think my kiddos give me the fruit to see how much fruit I can balance walking down the hallway. ---Yes, Yes, I know I need a basket.

Anyway, each day after lunch my class likes to arrange the fruit in an array. I’m a math person, so of course I love this. Besides, it usually doesn’t take them but just a few seconds.

The other day however, there were a couple kids trying to get the fruit in an array unsuccessfully. Then, another couple of kids jumped in to “help.” Finally, I asked them what was taking so long. One of my sweet kiddos explained that they were trying to make an array as he began lining the apples in one long line off my table. (The only possible array.)  

I counted the apples and told the class that there were 17 apples. I asked them to write in their journal why they thought we were having so much trouble putting 17 apples into an array. Some kiddos thought it was because 17 was an odd number. Many thought it was because 17 was a prime number. Do other odd numbers have more than one array? This was a perfect moment to review prime numbers.

In the end my kiddos made this 3 by 5 array with 2 extra.