Christmas Cookie Problem Solving

Editor's note: This post was originally published on December 22, 2015. 

The best way for parents to bring math into their children's everyday life is to help them see and make connections. Any opportunity to bring math to the forefront of an activity, idea, or problem is going to help children start to make connections to their thinking and problem solving. Whether it’s during sports, cooking, driving, etc…helping our children to see how they will use math in their everyday life is a wonderful experience to expose them to.

Creating opportunities for problem solving is even more beneficial! Here are some appropriate grade level problems for kids to solve when making Christmas Cookies that is a family holiday favorite of ours. Consider creating some of your own math problems while baking, decorating, and eating Christmas cookies this holiday!

First Grade:

1. Kathryn baked 12 snowflake cookies. Then, she baked some Santa cookies. Kathryn now has baked 20 cookies. How many Santa cookies did Kathryn bake?

 Kathryn baked __________ Santa cookies.

1. At the Christmas Bake Sale they were selling chocolate, vanilla, and peanut butter flavored cookies. If 6 students want chocolate, 7 students want vanilla, and 4 students want peanut butter, how many cookies will the teacher need to buy for everyone?

______________ cookies

Second Grade:

1. Timmy is baking cookies for a Christmas party that 19 people are attending. On Friday he baked 4 cookies and on Saturday he baked 11 more cookies. How many more cookies does Timmy have left to bake?

______________ cookies

1. Dan has 4 packages of cookies. Each package has 100 cookies. His friend gives him some more cookies. Which number shows how many cookies Dan could have altogether?

1. 49
2. 54
3. 341
4. 403

Third Grade:

1. Suzy has 28 gingerbread men. She wants to share them equally among 4 boxes. Write an equation that uses division to show how Suzy will put 7 gingerbread men in each box. Draw a model to show your thinking.

1. Mary is making snowmen cookies. She wants to buy M&Ms for the buttons. She needs to use 3 M&Ms on each snowman for the buttons. How many M&Ms should Mary buy?

______________ M&Ms