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2nd out of 42 books
—
23 voters
How Much Is a Million?
Ever wonder just what a million of something means? How about a billion? Or a trillion?
Paperback, 40 pages
Published
December 28th 2004
by HarperCollins
(first published 1985)
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Kindergarteners make an excellent reading audience. At tutoring every week, we primarily practice letter, number, and quantity recognition with the group of students, so when I found How Much is a Million? on the Title 1 bookshelf, it was an ideal break-out when their attentions drifted away from the white board work.
This is a good concept book, and I was already thinking of how I could write an interactive reading lesson plan around it (probably with the focus of fantasy v. reality or repetiti...more
This is a good concept book, and I was already thinking of how I could write an interactive reading lesson plan around it (probably with the focus of fantasy v. reality or repetiti...more
How many years would it take you to count to one million? One billion? One trillion? What if you wanted to find a goldfish bowl big enough to hold a million or a billion or a trillion gold fish? This humorous, but accurate book follows a group of kids and Marvelosissimo, the Mathematical Magician, to answers these questions.
The illustrations show energetic children amazed at the sights Marvelosissimo shows them. The pictures are full of movement, splashing whales, climbing children. I also love...more
The illustrations show energetic children amazed at the sights Marvelosissimo shows them. The pictures are full of movement, splashing whales, climbing children. I also love...more
"If one million kids climbed onto one another's shoulders, they would be taller than the tallest buildings, higher than the highest mountains, and farther up than airplanes can fly." Marvelosissimo the Mathematical Magician holds an unforgettable math class. This book basically explains about how much a million would be visually, comparing it to kids standing on shoulders, or stars on a page or goldfish in a goldfish bowl. He then proceeds to use the same imagery to explain a billion and a trill...more
I have actually first heard of this book through “Weston Woods” and I have enjoyed it ever since! “How Much Is a Million?” is a mathematical children's book by David M. Schwartz along with illustrations by Steven Kellogg and it is about how Marvelosissimo the Mathematical Magician shows kids how much it would take to count to a million! “How Much Is a Million?” is a truly brilliant book for children who want to learn more about mathematics!
This book basically explains about how much a million wo...more
This book basically explains about how much a million wo...more
My six-year-old is insatiable about numbers right now, and this book absolutely hits the spot. It is mind-blowing, as the illustrations (Stephen Kellogg is a favorite of mine) and narrative effectively explore VERY large numbers that you sometimes hear thrown around in the news. Here you will learn that a trillion (a thousand billion) really is tremendous.
A sample...
A sample...
If one million kids climbed onto one another's shoulders, they would be... taller than the tallest buildings, higher than the high...more
I cannot for the life of me figure out why there is a unicorn in this book. There are aliens when the kids make a tower to Saturn’s rings, and I understand that, but the unicorn just seems completely out of place. Yes, Marvelosissimo is a “mathematical magician,” but I don’t think that requires the presence of a unicorn. It’s just baffling.
Besides that, this is a pretty straight-forward and entertaining book. The cover illustration is so busy, despite the white space that serves to highlight the...more
Besides that, this is a pretty straight-forward and entertaining book. The cover illustration is so busy, despite the white space that serves to highlight the...more
Brief summary: This book is about a explaining the magnitude of the number: one million. It goes through different scenarios that involve the number so that children can better understand that a million is huge.Genre: non-fiction, informational guide to understanding concepts
Reading Level: This book is for transitional readers because the text placement is varied and there are multiple lines on most pages. There is a mixture of regular and some harder words, which were mostly one or two syllable...more
Reading Level: This book is for transitional readers because the text placement is varied and there are multiple lines on most pages. There is a mixture of regular and some harder words, which were mostly one or two syllable...more
A great book that can help children be interested in math. Not only are the illustrations wrought in Kellogg's unique style, but there is an author's note in the end that helps the curious child through all the math used in the book. All around cool.
The copy I received has a "Reading Rainbow" insignia on the cover. There is no doubt why such a great program would have featured this book. It deserves to become part of any library, home or school.
Granted, the book does scream 80's (example: child...more
The copy I received has a "Reading Rainbow" insignia on the cover. There is no doubt why such a great program would have featured this book. It deserves to become part of any library, home or school.
Granted, the book does scream 80's (example: child...more
This book helps put into perspective large quantities of numbers: millions, billions, and trillions. For students to be able to understand through pictures and words, how to better grasp the conceptual side of how much a million of something might look like.
This book does an excellent job for students to be able to "see" what a million of something would look like through the visual's it presents in within the book.
This book is an informational type of literacy that brings the students ways to...more
This book does an excellent job for students to be able to "see" what a million of something would look like through the visual's it presents in within the book.
This book is an informational type of literacy that brings the students ways to...more
Feb 17, 2011
Dolly
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
parents reading with their children
This book offers a fun and imaginative way to describe just how big a million, a billion and a trillion are using concrete figures of a child's height, time, a quantity of water, and pages of stars to illustrate the somewhat abstract concept of such large numbers. The information was mind-blowing and the illustrations are fun. We are looking forward to reading If You Made a Million and On Beyond a Million: An Amazing Math Journey by this author.
1 like · like · see review
This book uses real life examples and magical-like drawings to illustrate the size of the numbers one million, one billion, and one trillion. I appreciate the fact that the book uses illustrations to help kids understand the immensity of these numbers in a fun way, that they can comprehend. My favorite parts were the title page, which features a full-bleed, double page spread of the kids preparing for a marathon and pulled the reader into the story immediately, and also the seven pages of the ki...more
Have you ever wondered how much really is a million? Well if you read this book, you can stop wondering. This book talks about how a million would look in many different forms. In the form of stars and then in the form of items on the Earth. I would love to have this book in my classroom and no matter what age, I would love to talk to the children about numbers. When talking about numbers you can talk about small numbers a lot, but we never really talk about big numbers, numbers that seem intang...more
If you've ever wondered how big a bowl you would need to hold a million goldfish, or how many years it would take to count to a million, then this is the book for you. The illustrations in this book are perfect for helping children become familiar with large number concepts.
My favorite aspect of the book are the illustrations. Children will want to try counting the author's illustrations, which are clear and imaginative.
I would recommend this book to young children, grades K-4th who have an in...more
My favorite aspect of the book are the illustrations. Children will want to try counting the author's illustrations, which are clear and imaginative.
I would recommend this book to young children, grades K-4th who have an in...more
Similar to Can You Count To a Googol by Robert E. Wells this book explores large numbers. I found that at the lower elementary level children are really fascinated by large numbers so this book takes them clear up to a million and beyond! It has a lot of neat facts in it and as an added bonus at the end of the book there is a section where it explains (for the adults benefit) how all of the different calculations were came up with to make the comparisions of how large certains things are. This b...more
Marvelossismo, the magic mathematician, shows children fun ways to conceptualize a million in How Much Is A Million? I read this to my first grade class after seeing it in the school media center and the students loved it! They were so amazed at the idea of a million gold fish or even a million kids. After reading the story, the students were using their imagination and wondering how big a million schools would be and if it would be tall enough to touch the sky. This is a great book to have the...more
Not only is this book super cute, humorous, and adorable, it is informational too; for all ages! Even as a college freshman and a math minor, I found this book very enlightening. Sometimes it can be really hard to grasp the concept of big numbers like a million, a billion, and a trillion. But this book really puts it into perspective. Some of the facts about how big a million is surprised me! The pictures in this book are also very funny! I would definitely suggest reading this book to students...more
David M. Schwartz's "How Much Is a Million?" does a great job of contextualizing large numbers for young children. It seems that it is often the case that young children have difficulty in assessing how much a specific number is worth. By using grand, over-the-top examples like the fact that, if one were to count to one billion it would take 95 years, it can help children to see the worth of large digits. Illustrator Steven Kellogg's pictures are very detailed throughout the book. The colors, mo...more
This engaging story attempts to help students comprehend what the terms: million, billion, and trillion mean. Since these three words are rarely used or seen during an ordinary day, the writer provides examples of these amount using real objects and concepts. For instance, "if a million students stood on each other's shoulders, they would be higher than the tallest mountain." He also writes that it would take you 23 days to count from one to one million. These examples show students just how lar...more
This would be a fun book to use with first or second grade students in order to help them better grasp the concept of 1 million. Children often use the words million trillion billion every day but few actually understand how large those numbers are. This book will help students better grasp the idea by using real world scenarios that are relevant to their lives. A fun activity to use with this book would be to ask children to make their own "million" sentences by saying things that they think eq...more
I've been reading this book to my classes pretty much my entire career. I am not certain how I came upon it, but it is a good book to demonstrate exactly how large numbers are. I used to have an oversize edition of this book, but it remained in the classroom at my former school. I now check out this book from our school library each year.
It takes 23 days to count from one to one million. It takes 95 years to count from one to one billion. A fish bowl the size of a football stadium is needed to h...more
It takes 23 days to count from one to one million. It takes 95 years to count from one to one billion. A fish bowl the size of a football stadium is needed to h...more
Genre: K-3 Concept Book
Awards:
Boston Globe–Horn Book Award Honor Book
Beehive Award (Utah)
ALA Booklist Editors’ Choice
ALA Notable Children’s Book
Reading Rainbow Book
Bank Street Children's Book Award
This book is an excellent children's concept book. It begins by talking about a million, then a billion, and finally a trillion. For each of these huge numbers, the author gives almost unbelievable pictures and descriptions of how big these numbers actually are. For example, "if a goldfish bowl were b...more
Awards:
Boston Globe–Horn Book Award Honor Book
Beehive Award (Utah)
ALA Booklist Editors’ Choice
ALA Notable Children’s Book
Reading Rainbow Book
Bank Street Children's Book Award
This book is an excellent children's concept book. It begins by talking about a million, then a billion, and finally a trillion. For each of these huge numbers, the author gives almost unbelievable pictures and descriptions of how big these numbers actually are. For example, "if a goldfish bowl were b...more
Ever have trouble visualizing a million, or a billion, or even a trillion of something? Then this is the book for you! Marvelosissimo the Mathematical Magician brings the concept of large numbers down into objects children can visualize, such as gold fish, or stars, or even kids...a million kids? Hard to imagine, unless you have this book. Use it for preschool storytime or even the math section of a preschool or K-2 classroom.
CIP Summary:
Text and pictures try to make possible the conceptualizati...more
CIP Summary:
Text and pictures try to make possible the conceptualizati...more
This book would be a fantastic introduction to the idea of large place values. After reading this book to my students, we would engage in a discussion about big numbers. We could start smaller - centers that would have students group items of 10 ten times over in order to represent 100. Then, we could start a year long project where we create stars to see how many we could make. Ideally, we would make several hundred over the course of the year to show how long it takes to really get to 1 millio...more
This is one of my favorite Steven Kellogg books, as it combines his lively illustrations with impressive math. I love to share this book with my class during our number sense unit at the beginning of the year, in order to provide comparisons about how big numbers these numbers are. Kids are astounded at how long it would take to count to a million and a billion, as well as how big a fishbowl with that many fish would be.
Kids enjoy the illustrations, the dialog boxes and the math connection.
Kids enjoy the illustrations, the dialog boxes and the math connection.
This book is great for students who really love to use big numbers when guessing how much of something. It really show number relations of how you can count to a million using objects. It also reference billion and trillion. I like that this book really allows children to think outside of the box. Being that this book is related to Georgia's Bright from the Start curriculum you can find some really fun activities associated with it. There are also other books in this series.
Plot summary: Marvelosissimo, the Mathematic Magician, takes a group of children on a journey to help them comprehend larger numbers.
Strengths: Helps put larger numbers into context that children can understand. Author's note provides background for all computations and would make a good lesson.
Weaknesses: Explanation of computations at the end of the book might confuse students if not read before the rest of the book.
General: Excellent way to suppoprt a math lesson
Strengths: Helps put larger numbers into context that children can understand. Author's note provides background for all computations and would make a good lesson.
Weaknesses: Explanation of computations at the end of the book might confuse students if not read before the rest of the book.
General: Excellent way to suppoprt a math lesson
Great illistrations and concepts make up the pages of this book to discribe millions, trillions and billions. Children can better understand the magnitude of these concepts by seeing how many pages 100 stars can fit on to help them grasp the number of pages they would need for a million stars.
Have students guess how many pages there would need to be for a trillion stars. Give them 100 of something and have them guess what a million of that would look like.
Have students guess how many pages there would need to be for a trillion stars. Give them 100 of something and have them guess what a million of that would look like.
So often it is hard for children and even adults to visualize one million or other big numbers. I would use this book with students in grade 2-5. I would focus on ways that we could comprehend big numbers so they make sense to us. We could look at the number one million and talk about all the things we know about one million. For lower grades, of course we would focus on a smaller number like 100 or 1000. How many 1000 does it take to get to one million?
This book is written in a portrait orientation which allows the illustrations to take up the majority of the pages and because many of the items in the story are stacked on top of each other, the books orientation allows for the imagery of how large a million really is. The colorful illustrations allow make the story more playful and fun, because a book would be hard to write about how big a million is without a fun colorful, playful twist.
Wow! great math book! A million is so much to a child to understand- this books breaks down a million into child terms. The book relates numbers to objects and sizes children understand. This allows for the children to really understand how much a million really is! But not only does the book explain a million- it explains a billion and trillion too! Great great great book to introduce just how big million and billion and trillion really is!
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As a child, I was filled with a sense of awe as I contemplated the universe. The huge numbers of stars and their sizes and distances never failed to amaze me. With binoculars and magnifying glass, I also focused on closer subjects like birds, flowers, frogs and bugs.
But science and math weren't my only fascinations: I also loved bicycles, baseball, boats…and ice cream. Years later, on a clear spr...more
More about David M. Schwartz...
But science and math weren't my only fascinations: I also loved bicycles, baseball, boats…and ice cream. Years later, on a clear spr...more
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Nov 09, 2011 09:23pm
Nov 10, 2011 12:58pm