A girly math book

I was traveling for two weeks so that's why this blog has been quiet... but now I'm back with tons of emails to go through and so.

One of them had an interesting link:

Math Doesn't Suck - a book whose cover looks like a girl magazine, but inside it should be solid fractions, percents, ratios and similar middle school math topics.

It's written in a "girly" style to middle school age girls, by the actress Danica McKellar (best known as Winnie Cooper in "The Wonder Years", inspiring them with the idea that math is not far from girls' life and activities. The book includes mentions of baking cookies, fashion, makeup, and such girly topics.

She wants to encourage girls to study math so that more of them would take it in college. But the problem is so many start dropping out and getting behind during the middle school years, and especially because of not understanding fractions and related topics.

You can read an interview of the author here and another good one here.

Disclaimer: I haven't read this myself. Some might not like it because of the style; talking about makeup, fashion, cheer leading and others. See some discussion about that here — the book sure has created controversy. I personally might have to be selective and careful, if I was using it with my daughters.