More or Less? Need to Guess!

Author: Gayathri Tirthapura

Illustrator: Sahitya Rani
"Ranju, can you get me two coconuts from that
basket?"

Ranjita raced to the other side of the room. She

returned in an instant with the two coconuts.

Amma was pleased. "Thank you, darling! You are

such a help."

Ranjita glowed with pride. It was a BIG day today -

her uncle Mahesh Chikkappa's wedding! And she
had a BIG responsibility - to hand over mithai boxes
to the 100 guests after lunch.

2
3
But where were the mithai boxes?

"Oh no!" cried Amma. "The boxes are still in the room upstairs! Run and bring them down quickly, Ranju.
The guests have almost finished their lunch."

"Amma, you never ask ME for help!" said a small, whiny voice. "And I'm hungry."

"You can help Akka, Vikky," said Amma soothingly. "Ranju, take him with you, please?"

Ranjita frowned. Why did Amma always do this? Her little brother Vikram was SO annoying! But there was
no time to argue.

4
"You have to listen to me and do
exactly as I say, Vikky!" she
warned him, making her eyes big
and stern.

Vikram nodded. "I will, Akka!

Promise!"

5
6
Upstairs, in a corner, were a pile
of cloth bags. Ranjita pulled open
a bag. There were several small
mithai boxes inside.

"It will take too long to empty all

the bags and count out 100
boxes, Akka!" Vikram was very
worried. "And I'm very hungry."

"Shhhh!" said Ranjita fiercely.

"Let me think!"

7
Ranjita thought hard. Vikram was right. It would take too long to actually count out 100 boxes. They couldn't
take all the bags down either. There were too many of them.

Vikram looked longingly at the mithai boxes. "Can I open one? I'm VERY hungry."

8
"NO!" said Ranjita.

Then she smiled. "Idea! We don’t need to take

EXACTLY 100 mithai boxes! We can take
APPROXIMATELY 100. That will be much quicker."

"Approximately?" Vikram looked puzzled. "What

does that mean, Akka?"

"It means a few MORE than, or a few LESS than, the

exact number," said Ranjita.

"Bu-ut," Vikram said slowly, "If we take less than

100, there won't be enough for everyone."

9
"So we take more!" said Ranjita.

"Ok, let’s do it!" Vikram grabbed a few bags.

"Quick! I'm very, VERY hungry!"

"Wait, silly! Let me tell you HOW to approximate

first!" said Ranjita.

She poured out all the boxes from one bag onto the
floor and counted them. "See, Vikky," she said.
"There are 10 mithai boxes in this bag." Vikram
nodded.

10
11
Ranjita pointed to the other bags.
"All the bags are approximately,
more or less, the same size. What
does that tell you?"

Vikram shrugged.

"It tells you that each bag has

approximately, more or less, 10
mithai boxes!" said Ranjita.

"Oh THAT!" said Vikram airily. "I

knew THAT."

12
Ranjita hid her grin. "Tell me this, then. How many mithai boxes in two bags?"

"Approximately-more-or-less 20*," said Vikram instantly.

"And in three bags?"

"Approximately-more-or-less 30**!" Vikram began to smile. He was getting the hang of this.

"And in five?"

"Approximately-more-or-less 50***!" yelled Vikram. "And 50 is half**** of all the mithai boxes we need!"

*(10 x 2 = 20),
**(10 x 3 = 30)
***(10 x 5 = 50)
**** (Half of 100 = 100 / 2 = 50)

13
"That's very good, Vikky!" said Ranju admiringly.

Vikram turned red with delight. He loved it when his Akka praised him.
"Now can I open a mithai..." Ranjita glared.

"I mean," Vikram said quickly, "I will take 5 bags with approximately-
more-or-less 50 boxes, and you take 5. Okay?"

14
"Not so fast!" said Ranjita. "We haven't counted the boxes in every bag. What if one or two bags have only 8
boxes? We won't have enough for everyone then."

15
Vikram paused. As usual, Akka was right.

"So we take 11 bags, then?" he asked slowly. "With approximately-more-

or-less 110 mithai boxes?"

"Exactly!" said Ranjita. "You take 5 bags, and I will take 6. Come on!"

The children ran down the stairs with the bags. Amma was waiting
anxiously. She was very relieved to see them.

"That was quick!" said Amma. "Are you sure we have enough for
everyone?"

"Yes, Amma," said Vikky. "I am very, very sure. AND... I'm very, very,
VERY hungry."

16
When all the guests had left,
Amma hugged Ranjita and
Vikram. "You both saved the
day!" she said.

Then she narrowed her eyes.

"I've never seen you both work
so well together," she said.
"Does that mean you finally like
each other?"

Ranjita and Vikram laughed.

"Approximately-more-or-less!"
they said, as they ran to lunch.

17
18
 THE GUESSING GAME
Ranjita and Vikram used a clever mathematical trick to get their job done quickly. They called it 'Approximately
More or Less'; mathematicians call it 'Estimation'.

So what is Estimation? Is it like guessing? Sort of, but estimation is 'intelligent' guessing.
Why is estimation important?

Estimation helps you identify wrong answers quickly.

For instance, let's say you have just 30 seconds to answer this question:
1. What is 17 x 9?
a. 172
b. 153
c. 186
d. 89

You know that 17 x 10 = 170 (anything into ten is the same number with a zero at the end). So 17 x 9 should be
LESS than that. That means Options (a) and (c) are wrong. Option (d) seems too small to be the right answer - 17 x
9 should be closer to 170. So you pick Option (b). See how estimation has helped you pick the right option, simply
by identifying the wrong ones?

19
Estimation helps alert you to real-life errors. When the shopkeeper totals
your bill, you can tell instantly if it is wrong because you have estimated
approximately how much it should be.

Estimation helps you calculate distances. If you know that you cover 30
cm with each step, and that you take 1800 steps to walk from home to the
library, you can estimate the distance between the two (1800 x 30 cm =
54000 cms = 540 m, which is about half a kilometre).

Estimation is fun. How many peas inside half a kilo of unshelled pods? How
many elephants should you stand on top of each other to make the height
of your flagpole? You can find out answers to all kinds of wacky questions
using estimation!

20
 This book was made possible by Pratham Books' StoryWeaver platform. Content under Creative
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Story Attribution:
This story: More or Less? Need to Guess! is written by Gayathri Tirthapura . © Pratham Books , 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license.
Other Credits:
This book was first published by Pratham Books on StoryWeaver (www.storyweaver.org.in). The development of this book has been supported by Oracle. Guest
Editor: Roopa Pai, Art Director: Kaveri Gopalakrishnan
Illustration Attributions:
Cover page: Two children sitting on piles of sweet boxes, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 2: A
mother speaking to her daughter, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 3: Girl at a South Indian
wedding , by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 5: A girl instructing a young boy, by Sahitya Rani ©
Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 6: A boy and a girl running up the stairs, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017.
Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 7: A girl and boy counting mithai boxes, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved.
Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 8: A girl and a boy thinking deeply, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0
license. Page 9: A young girl dressed for a wedding , by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 10: A girl
holding a stack of sweet boxes, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 11: A sister and a brother
opening boxes of sweets, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 12: A boy looking at bags of sweets,
by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license.

Disclaimer: https://www.storyweaver.org.in/terms_and_conditions

Some rights reserved. This book is CC​-BY​-4.0 licensed. You can copy, modify, distribute
and perform the work, even for commercial purposes, all without asking permission.
For full terms of use and attribution, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ The development of this book has been supported by Oracle.
 This book was made possible by Pratham Books' StoryWeaver platform. Content under Creative
Commons licenses can be downloaded, translated and can even be used to create new stories ​‐
provided you give appropriate credit, and indicate if changes were made. To know more about this,
and the full terms of use and attribution, please visit the following link.

Illustration Attributions:
Page 14: Bags and boxes, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 15: Guests at a wedding in South
India, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 16: Eleven bags, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books,
2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 17: Children hugging their mother, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights
reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 18: A mother looking at her children , by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released
under CC BY 4.0 license. Page 20: A girl thinking, a boy with a box, by Sahitya Rani © Pratham Books, 2017. Some rights reserved. Released under CC BY 4.0 license.

Disclaimer: https://www.storyweaver.org.in/terms_and_conditions

Some rights reserved. This book is CC​-BY​-4.0 licensed. You can copy, modify, distribute
and perform the work, even for commercial purposes, all without asking permission.
For full terms of use and attribution, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ The development of this book has been supported by Oracle.
More or Less? Need to
Guess! So many mithai boxes to count, so little time! Can Ranjita and Vikram
do it? Yes, using a cool math trick called 'Approximately More-or-Less'!
(English) Read this fun wedding story to learn the trick yourself!

This is a Level 3 book for children who are ready to read on their own.

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