Back in my day, when a boy misbehaved, he would be threatened with “The Paddle” being administered to his back side. I don’t advocate going back to this corporal punishment. However, with the news that scientists raising the alarm about a dangerous fire retardant in black plastic spatulas miscalculated 60 times 7,000 to a product of 42,000—off by a factor of 10,* I think these less fearsome implements could be repurposed to gently tap some math sense into their heads.
As you can see pictured, I found one, very old, black plastic spatula (classic KitchenAid!) in our kitchen utensil drawer, which I will retire from service but retain as a Halloween decoration or donate to the cause of math ‘education.’
*That viral black plastic kitchen utensil study was overblown thanks to a simple math mistake , Mashable, Tim Marcin, December 16, 2024.