Oh, Halloween! You beautiful, wretched, blessed and cursed holiday!
You bring so much candy into our world. For better and for worse.
Tabitha the other evening was offered a choice from her Halloween stash before the bedtime rituals commenced. She chose a Tootsie Roll. It was one of the recently documented 3-Ootsie Tootsies.
As has been established, Tootsie Rolls take a long time to eat. Rather than lament this fact, I rolled with it.
Me: Did you know there’s a word for how long it takes to eat part of a Tootsie Roll?
Tabitha (5): No. What is it?
Me: It’s an “Ootsie”.
Griffin (8): Wait! I thought an Ootsie was one-eleventh of a Tootsie!
Me: Whoa! How did you remember that?
G: Because there’s 11 Ootsies in a Tootsie.
Technically, Griffin is wrong here. We do not have any documented evidence of the existence of an 11 Ootsie Tootsie, much as we may wish such a thing would exist.
But that’s not the point. The point is that talking math with your kids has consequences. They remember stuff and they make connections. And they expect things to make sense. And they call you on it when things do not make sense.
Plus, if you watch the commercial, not even Tootsie Roll Industries is clear on what attribute an Ootsie measures. Is it length, mass or time?
Overthinking my teaching 