Connecting Math to Our Lives Math Report Interviews with our Parents about Math in Their Lives   UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: Report from Nativity School, Cincinnati, age 9 to 10, Teacher Patti Burwinkel.   Math Interview By Madeline Fisk My Dad sells insurance for a living. He uses numbers everyday at work. Some ways are simple like using a telephone and a calculator. Some ways are hard like adding up the numbers of hours his employee's work and how much they get in their paycheck. He also figures up their taxes in their checks. He uses numbers to find out information to tell his clients about which policies they will need and how much it will cost. He figures out how much insurance they will need. My Dad's business grows by how many people buy their insurance from him. He has to report a written record of all his sales and sales of his employees to his boss. He uses addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. A long time ago in my Dad's business people would figure out all this information without computers. My Dad uses a computer to help him figure out. That is how my Dad says he uses math everyday.   Math Interview By Addy Anaya I interviewed my dad, Tony Anaya. He is a lawyer. He uses math everyday at work. One way he uses math is to figure out how much his clients will pay him. He charges some of his clients based on how many hours he works multiplied by how much he charges them each hour. When a client is hurt in an accident, my dad will have the client pay him on a contingent fee basis. This means that once my dad collects money for the client, he divides it with his client. My dad uses math to figure out how much he should get and how much the client should get. He also uses math to figure out the value of a client's case. He does this to see if he should take the case. He also uses math to figure out his business expenses. When he takes a business trip, he gets reimbursed for how many miles he drives times how much he gets paid per mile. He uses math when he makes copies, so he knows how many he made. He also uses math for postage. He has to weigh the letter to see how much it will cost so that he can pay the mailman.   Math Interview By Ross Bateman My dad is a dentist. He uses math every day in many ways. When he sees patients, he uses lots of weights and measurements. Sometimes the measurements are exact and sometimes he estimates. When he fills a cavity, he measures the amount of filling material to fill the hole in the tooth. He also uses math when he sets a timer for the laser that bleaches teeth. Time is important when he makes an impression, or mold, of teeth. It takes a certain amount of time for the material to harden. The needles and drills come in different sizes for different uses. When he mixes certain solutions, they need to be measured. My ad uses math to figure out how much money a patient should pay. Then he decides how much money he needs to pay the dental lab for the work they do for them, such as making dentures. One of the last things my dad does is figure out how many days, weeks or months a patient needs to come back to see him. My dad uses math all day long!     Math Interview By Sam Holt I interviewed my mom, Angie Holt, about how she uses math in her job and in her daily life. My mom works in the lunchroom at a high school. She cooks and sells food to the students. She told me that sometimes she has to use math to multiply or divide the recipes she uses. She has to use math to give the right change back to the students when they pay for their lunch. When I asked about other ways she used math she said she has to use math when she pays the bills and balances the checkbook. She uses math when the family takes trips in the car to figure out how long it will take to get where we are going. My mom uses math when she sews costumes for the plays. When she is shopping for groceries, she needs to use math. I asked my mom if knowing math was important to her and she said she uses math every single day.