John’s second grade class has been working on a math section entitled “Money and Time”.

This is also an economics lesson and a life lesson. Because time is money. But money can’t buy you time.

One recent lesson focused on A.M. and P.M. Honestly, I had to look up the meaning of those terms as my Latin is non-existent. According to The Royal Museums Greenwich “am stands for the Latin ante meridiem, translating to ‘before midday’. This is the time before the sun has crossed the meridian. pm stands for post meridiem or ‘after midday’ – after the sun has crossed the meridian”. Basically, A.M. is anything before noon and P.M. is anything after noon.

John’s assignment focused on selecting the appropriate time of day for various activities.

In the free response section, John indicated that the morning is for math, at 8:20am. And the evening is for baseball. 6:15pm sharp.

I particularly enjoyed his explanation on the Chapter 7 Review/Test. His answer doesn’t tell you why his answer is right. It tells you why the other option is wrong.

But one problem threw John for a serious loop. It involved the time of day for walking the dog and the solution wasn’t readily apparent. He donned my cardigan in the hopes of finding the correct answer.

As I made dinner, we had a deep conversation as we searched for the answer together.

John: “I can’t figure this one out Mom.”

Me: “What’s the question again?”

John: “Does Dan walk the dog at 4:30am or 4:30pm.”

Me (thinking the answer rather obvious): “What do you think?”

John: “Well, here’s the thing. I’m up early in the morning. And I see people walking their dogs. It could go either way.”

An excellent observation. I now understood his struggle.

So the math problem turned into an English lesson. We explored author intent and audience. John acknowledged that the math book was written for 2nd graders. He further stipulated that most eight years old should be sleeping at 4:30 in the morning. The AM selection was made and the homework sheet tucked into his folder.

The baffling time problem was solved. The process to get to that solution was money.