Livemint, India
Feb 16 2008

One, two, three, go…

A fun-filled lifeline for those children who think they are drowning
in math
Under 15 | M Venkatesh

Mathematwist: Number Tales from Around the World
By T.V. Padma,
Tulika,
94 pages,
Rs175.

T.V. Padma (she writes as Padma Venkatraman for adults) has written
animal stories, historical fiction, science and folk tales for
children. This one is `mathematical folk tales’ and the book has
cleverly used the concept to pass on a scientific, not moral,
message. No child should pass up the opportunity to own this
collection of mathematical reasoning. `All children love stories, but
not all like mathematics. So I combined both,’ says Padma.

The book starts off with the delightful tale of the Armenian merchant
who sets off to the market under strict instructions from his wife to
sell their seven donkeys without losing any. He counts them, ties
them together, climbs on one and sets out. Midway into the journey,
astride one of the donkeys, he starts counting again and finds that
there are just six. Puzzled, he jumps off and counts – seven again.

Happily jumping on to a donkey, he starts counting and discovers six.
Finding that being on terra firma gets the seventh donkey back, he
starts walking with them till he meets a woman who asks him why he is
walking when he has so many donkeys. Laughing at his naivety, she
comments that she can see eight donkeys. The Armenian sells off his
donkeys but can’t stop thinking about the `poor woman who couldn’t
count’.

Fourteen number tales from 10 countries make up this collection.
Tales from Rome, China, Ethiopia, Greece, Russia, the US, Vietnam,
India and a Jewish one comprise the numbers game. The Roman tale has
Caesar’s intelligence saving the treasury a lot of money. In the
Ethiopian tale, a father gives his three sons a coin each and tells
them, `Whoever amongst you can buy something that can fill this room
will inherit my house after my death.’ Among the other stories is one
about a Vietnamese king who wants his scientists to calculate when
the world would end. Read it and figure it out for yourselves. We
won’t give out the secrets here.

Mathematwist is full of interesting snippets. Did you know that
logarithms were invented in India and that the Western world didn’t
know about them till the 17th century? `What is referred to as Arabic
numeral,’ points out Padma, `is actually Indian. And not all
mathematical formulae came from Greece,’ she argues. She feels India
has not got due recognition. As acknowledgment of that fact,
Mathematwist has five folk tales from India.

Padma chose math out of `choice’. As a child, she loved the world of
language as much as that of math. `I had some very good teachers,’
she says, giving credit where it is due. `My mother,’ she remembers,
`told me that as a child I used to love solving arithmetic problems.’
That love stayed for life. Ten years ago, she decided to do something
about it and the idea for Mathematwist was born. She knew a couple of
folk tales which had a mathematical angle. After much research,
similar tales from other countries were reformulated to weave this
book.

Are children reading books? If children are to read, she says,
`Adults, too, should read children’s books. Harry Potter, for
instance, allowed that.’ Mathematwist has something for teachers,
too. On her website, , there is a free guide
to the book, which can be downloaded.

Padma – who lives in Rhode Island, USA – has been in various interesting
jobs. She was chief scientist on several scientific cruises at the
Institute of Meereskunde in Kiel, Germany, and director of a school
in England. Her next book for young adults, Climbing The Stairs, is
set to hit bookshelves in May.

(The writer is the editor of Heek (e-heek.com), a children’s
magazine. Write to lounge@livemint.com)

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