Wait a minute – horses have toes?! They do. Animals with hooves, like horses, pigs, cows, and even aardvarks, have toes! The hoof is the tip of the toe. Animals with an odd number of toes are all cousins with each other, and those with even numbers are a different family. So who has what? Horses and rhinoceroses are odd-toed: each hoof is just 1 toe. But cows, pigs, giraffes, camels, deer, and hippopotamuses are all even-toed, usually 1 big toe in front and a small one in back. Question: where do we put the nail polish?
Wee ones: How many toes do you have on 1 foot? What numbers would you say to count them?
Little kids: In a set of 5 toes, which number toe is exactly in the middle? Bonus: If you paint nail polish on the 1st toe, then skip the 2nd, paint the 3rd…how many toes on that foot get polish?
Big kids: Horses today have 1 toe on each foot, while goats have 2 toes on each. If you have the same number of goats and horses and there are 24 toes altogether, how many of each animal do you have? Bonus: Horses have 1 toe on each foot, while goats have 2 toes on each foot. If there are 2 horses in a field, how many goats would have to join them to make a total of 56 toes in the field?
Answers:
Wee ones: We have 5 toes on each foot: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.
Little kids: The 3rd toe. Bonus: 3 toes.
Big kids: 2 of each animal. One horse-goat pair has 12 toes (4+8), so you need 2 of those pairs to have 24 toes. Bonus: 6 goats, since the horses have 8 toes. 56 – 8 = 48, and 48 / 8 = 6.
