21 Math Quotes For Kids To Make Math Fun

You’ve probably used inspirational quotes to teach your kids values that you’d like them to embrace. Or, maybe you’ve had your kids repeat quotes as affirmations to build up their confidence. But, have you ever thought about using math quotes for kids to encourage them to embrace why math is important or help them remember some math facts? It might not be the first thing you think of when reinforcing math skills, but using math sayings for kids can be another method you can use to make math fun.

One great thing about math quotes for kids that inspire is that they can lead to additional conversations about math. Understanding some funny math quotes may take some explanation about the mathematical terms used in them. Kids may remember basic math definitions based on the funny math sayings or positive math quotes you teach them. 

If you teach your kids famous math quotes, or at least math quotes said by famous people, you can also get a little biography and history in, too. For example, there’s a math quote below by Paul Harvey. If your child doesn’t know who Paul Harvey was, you can talk about who he was, maybe even getting into a discussion about the importance of radio announcers way back when. Who knows where these math quotes for kids may lead you.

Check out our other math for kids posts: 

• Math Tricks For Kids You Can Teach At Home
• Fun Mental Math Strategies For Kids
• The Importance Of Math Fluency For Kids

Funny Math Quotes

Some of these math sayings for kids are pretty funny, but some children may need some explanations as to why. If they aren’t familiar with concepts like Pi, statistics, or odd numbers, they won’t get the joke immediately. That just gives you a chance to do have a little extra math lesson when you’re talking about the quote. 

• Math: The only place where people buy 60 watermelons and no one wonders why. – Anonymous
  
• If there is a 50-50 chance that something can go wrong, then 9 times out of ten it will. - Paul Harvey
  
• Arithmetic is being able to count up to twenty without taking off your shoes. - Mickey Mouse
  
• What do mathematicians eat on Halloween? Pumpkin Pi. – Anonymous
  
• Decimals have a point. – Anonymous
  
• Have you heard the latest statistics joke? Probably. – Anonymous
  
• You know what seems odd to me? Numbers that aren’t divisible by two. – Anonymous
  

Positive Math Quotes For Inspiration​

These are math quotes meant to be inspirational about math. They also can inspire discussions about how math is related to art and creativity or how sometimes it takes a very long time to find the answer to a complicated math problem - and that’s okay.

• To me, mathematics, computer science, and the arts are insanely related. They’re all creative expressions. – Sebastian Thrun
• Life is a math equation. In order to gain the most, you have to know how to convert negatives into positives. – Anonymous
• Mathematics may not teach us to add love or subtract hate, but it gives us hope that every problem has a solution. – Anonymous
• It’s fine to work on any problem, so long as it generates interesting mathematics along the way – even if you don’t solve it at the end of the day. – Andrew Wiles
• If you stop at general math, then you will only make general money. – Snoop Dogg
•  “What is mathematics? It is only a systematic effort of solving puzzles posed by nature. - Shakuntala Devi
• The only way to learn mathematics is to do mathematics. – Paul Halmos

Famous Math Quotes

All of these quotes were said by people famous in math and science throughout history. In addition to talking about what the quotes mean, there’s a whole lot of biography and history to dig up related to those who said them. 

• Mathematics is the music of reason.  – James Joseph Sylvester
• Perfect numbers like perfect men are very rare.  – Rene Descartes
• Albert Einstein: Do not worry too much about your difficulties in mathematics, I can assure you that mine are still greater.  – Albert Einstein
• Film is one of the three universal languages, the other two: mathematics and music. – Frank Capra
• Somehow it’s okay for people to chuckle about not being good at math. Yet, if I said “I never learned to read,” they’d say I was an illiterate dolt. — Neil deGrasse Tyson
• Mathematics is the gate and key to science. – Roger Bacon
• In most sciences one generation tears down what another has built, and what one has established, another undoes. In mathematics alone, each generation adds a new story to the old structure — Hermann Hankel

How to Incorporate Math Quotes for Kids

How do you add these math slogans for kids into your day to day routine? Do you hit your kids with a quote as soon as they wake up? Probably not. Not too many people want to know Einstein’s thoughts on math before breakfast. Here are a few ways to incorporate these quotes more naturally into your day.

Use them as discussion questions during a meal. Some of the best conversations can happen when everyone is around the table. Maybe once a week or every other week, make those discussions math quote time. You may even get into deeper discussions about math or about problems your kids are having with math without ever having to ask.

When taking a snack break on game night. When it’s game night, sometimes you take a break to get a drink and a snack. If you’re playing a game like Math Sprint, a mental math board game that reinforces addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division math facts, it would be natural to bring up a math quote during the break. 

Write them on a chalkboard or whiteboard and just let them hang there. Sometimes you don’t have to have a discussion with kids about the quotes you want them to know. Some math quotes for kids can inspire when they’re seen several times and a child thinks them through on their own.