Cats: History, Science, and Story

MATH WITH (Millions of) CATS

	In Wanda Gag’s classic Million of Cats (Puffin, 2006), a lonely old man and woman decide they would like to have a cat, so the old man sets out to find the prettiest cat of all. He finds not just one, but “hundreds of cats, thousands of cats, millions and billions and trillions of cats.” Ultimately the cats, all insisting that they’re the prettiest, have a massive fight, leaving behind only a scrawny little black kitten, whom the old couple pronounce the prettiest of all. For ages 4-8.
	Good books to accompany Millions of Cats include David Schwartz’s How Much Is a Million? (HarperCollins, 2004), in which a Mathematical Magician introduces kids to the concept of a million with many creative analogies (a goldfish bowl big enough for a million goldfish could hold a blue whale; a stack of a million kids could reach all the way to the moon) and On Beyond a Million (Dragonfly Books, 2001), in which Professor X and a spouting popcorn machine provide a kid-friendly explanation of scientific notation and increasingly enormous numbers (up to a googol).
	See just what a million looks like (and learn a lot of fascinating facts along the way) with Andrew Clements’s picture book A Million Dots (Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2006).
	“In the city/windows light./How many cats/will dance tonight?” Caroline Stutson’s rhyming Cat’s Night Out (Simon & Schuster/Paula Wiseman Books, 2010) is an exercise in dance and counting by twos, as multiplying pairs of gorgeously outfitted cats samba, boogie, tango, tap, twist, and form a conga line on a clothesline. For ages 4-8.
	In Theoni Pappas’s The Adventures of Penrose, the Mathematical Cat (Wide World Publishing/Tetra, 1997), Penrose investigates pancake world, meets a fractal dragon and a Fibonacci rabbit, discovers infinity and Mobius strips, learns about tessellation, and more. For ages 7-12.
	Anne Akers Johnson’s Cat’s Cradle: A Book of String Figures (Klutz, 2009) has clear instructions for five traditional string figures: Cat’s Cradle, Cup and Saucer, Witch’s Broom, Jacob’s Ladder, and Eiffel Tower. Nice heavy-duty colored string is included with the book. For ages 6 and up.
	Cat’s cradle and math? (Absolutely.) James R. Murphy’s Murphy’s String Figures: Teaching Math With String Figures (CreateSpace, 2008) provides instructions for making many different figures and discusses how Murphy used string figures as a means of teaching math to math-hating high-school students. For more information, see Murphy’s website.

THE SCIENCE OF CATS: Purrs, Laps, Pounces, and Meows

	Juliet Clutton-Brock’s Cat (Dorling Kindersley, 2004) in the DK Eyewitness series is a lavishly illustrated survey of cat physiology and behavior, breeds, relatives, myths and legends, history, famous cats, and how to care for pet cats.  Each double-page spread is devoted to a separate topic. For ages 8 and up.
	How to say “hello” in cat? Rub heads. Jean Craighead George’s How to Talk to Your Cat (HarperCollins, 2003) gives readers the scoop on cat communication, including tail and ear signals, purring, and 19 different kinds of meows. For ages 7 and up.
	Who’s smarter: cats or dogs? See what science says.
	What color is a cat? Understanding the Basic Genetics of Cat Colors is an illustrated explanation of the genetics of fur color and pattern in cats. It turns out that there are really only two colors of cats: red and black.
	A Brief History of House Cats from Smithsonian magazine is the story of the domestication of the cat. Our house pets, scientists believe, originated from a Middle Eastern wildcat, and first linked up with humans about 12,000 years ago.
	From Scientific American, see The Evolution of House Cats.
	How cats lap: it’s more complicated than it looks. Read all about it here.
	Cat physics! Find out why cats always land on their feet.
	Why do cats purr? Nobody quite knows. See here for science’s best suggestions.
	John Gribbin’s In Search of Schrodinger’s Cat (Bantam Books, 1984) covers the history and physics of quantum theory (including Erwin Schrodinger’s famous cat-in-a-box thought experiment) for a popular audience. For teenagers and adults.
	See this short straightforward summary (with videos) of the famous Schrodinger’s Cat thought experiment.
	From the Unemployed Philosophers Guild: a Schrodinger’s Cat Finger Puppet.