This morning I chose black corduroys and a white sweater, then began to search for earrings. Black and white. I pulled out my egg carton of birds. Penguins.

I used to teach about penguins at this time of year. Our first grade visited every continent in Social Studies. I popped in to teach science. In Antarctica, we studied penguins. 

One Christmas, my children offered to make me earrings. What would I like? My list was long, full of science projects: African elephants, pandas from Asia, paper airplanes, Monarch butterflies... What fun I had on Christmas morning opening all of those tiny boxes of homemade earrings!

First thing this morning, a little girl in my math group looked at my ears. "I know why you wore those! They go with the multiplication problem that I wrote about the two iceburgs that each had 11 penguins on them!"

"Perfect!" I replied. "We'll start with your problem! Everyone write the equation for Hannah's problem. How many penguins would that be in all?"