How many of you have an old race used tire from one of your favourie drivers?

C'mon you've got one admit it.  You've got it in your basement on its side with a piece of glass on it and you are using it as a coffee table aren't you?  Or at least thats what you want to do with it but your wife won't let you.

I've got one - a left rear from Tony Stewart's old Home Depot car that has just 6 laps on it - but my wife won't let me use it as a coffee table.

In fact she doesn't want to see it at all.

She just doesn't get 'guy mentality', I mean it came off of Tony's car - he actually used the thing! 

Surely thats got to count for something right?

Nope and don't call me Shirley!

So I had to come up with an ingeneous way to keep the tire out of the next pile of household items ear-marked for the garage sale.

Hmm ...

Tire Swing?  No too big.

Flower Potter?  No doesn't go with the landscaping.

Put it on the kid's go-kart?  No, I need 3 more plus the rims.

Turn it into a water feature?  No it would create too much standing water and I could run the risk of the West Nile Virus on top of the H1N1 flu.

So I was faced with a dilema as my options were getting even more limited when it hit me - I can use it for work!

Ah ha!  That's it!

So I turned it into a math lesson for my 8th Grade class and now that it is a teaching resource I have to keep it!

Yes!

You know there is a lot you can do with a used NASCAR tire as far as math goes; circumference, volume, surface area, capacity, etc.

If any of you teacher folk out there want a copy of my assignment just let me know and I'll forward it allong to you - but you have to have your own NASCAR tire first!

Here are some pictures of the lesson in action: