Helping Your Teen with the Choices Ahead

Recommendations

Info

4 Math and Science in Daily Life You can help your teen discover the importance of math and science by pointing out how knowledge in these areas impacts his or her daily life, and how it will be relevant to your teen’s adult life. Math and science courses can help us understand the technology we use every day. For example: Cell Phones • Physics helps us understand why our phone calls are dropped in certain locations, such as in a valley or inside an elevator (because it is difficult for radio waves to travel through metal), and math helps us decide on the best rate plan, and which extra features we can afford. • Chemistry helps us understand how electricity and water can interact to damage the phone, and why the LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) screen won’t work right if it gets too hot or cold (the liquid crystals that make up the picture are susceptible to temperature changes). Driving • Physics helps explain why sports cars can go around corners at high speeds (because of their lower and wider stance) but SUVs flip over, and an understanding of biology helps engineers design crash-proof seats that keep us safe without damaging our internal organs. • Chemistry and physics help us understand how hybrid cars can charge their fuel cells and provide better mileage than gasburning engines, and math helps us understand the costbenefit trade-off of buying a hybrid car (more expensive to buy but less expensive to run). Math and science courses can help us understand the technology we use every day.
Your Teen’s Adult Life Math and science will become even more important in your teen’s adult life as he or she becomes more independent and assumes more responsibilities. Socializing with Friends • When hosting a party, preparing appealing and tasty food that won’t make guests sick requires your teen to understand chemistry and biology (e.g., how heat and refrigeration affect dairy products, fruits, and meats differently). • Biology and chemistry knowledge will help your teen understand how nutrition and sleep impact their alertness and brain functioning when working out, playing an instrument, dancing, or playing a game with friends. Shopping Your teen will use math skills when: • • Buying a home entertainment center or a computer (e.g., financing with a ‘zero’ money down offer may seem like a better deal at the time, but usually costs more in the long-term) Figuring out the unit cost for food, such as soda: if you have the choice of buying a 20 oz, 2-liter, 12-pack, or 24-pack, which purchase is actually the best deal per ounce of soda? Life On Their Own When starting their independent life, your teen will need to understand: How to choose their first apartment. • Math and geometry principles (area: length, width, height) will help your teen determine how much furniture they can fit into a 200 square foot apartment, whether their couch will fit up the stairs, and how many cans of paint are needed to paint the walls. 5
Page 1 and 2: Making Connections Helping Your Tee
Page 3 and 4: Table of Contents Helping Your Teen
Page 5: Ask your spouse, other family membe
Page 9 and 10: More Careers • Architects use phy
Page 11 and 12: When you watch an athlete, you are
Page 13 and 14: Chemistry Chemistry principles are
Page 16: Contact Information If you have que

Helping Your Teen with the Choices Ahead

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?