Holidays, Parenting & Kids

Pi Day? More Like Pi YAY!

Posted by The Dream Dinners Team on

Did you know that someone who loves learning, especially mathematics, is called a philomath?

Mini Chicken Pot PiesRegardless of whether you love or loathe math, March 14th represents an annual opportunity for food lovers to come together and celebrate Pi Day with pie-shaped foods. After all, who doesn’t love pie? You can celebrate with traditional dessert pies, pizza pie, shepherd’s pie, Dream Dinners Mini Chicken Pot Pies…the list goes on and on!

Pi Day Origins

According to the official Pi Day website, the holiday is celebrated on March 14th (3/14) to honor pi’s mathematical value. This symbol represents the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter, a “constant number” that equals approximately 3.14159. The earliest known official celebration of Pi Day was a 1988 event organized by Larry Shaw, a physicist at the San Francisco Exploratorium. In the last few decades, Pi Day celebrations have taken place in schools and universities around the country, with many events hosting pie-eating contests and pi recitations. Another common activity at Pi Day events is an Albert Einstein look-alike contest since the famous German physicist was born on March 14th.

Pi Day Equation GIF

Fun Facts about Pi:

  • Pi has been calculated to over one trillion digits beyond its decimal point.
  • Pi is an “irrational and transcendental number” that will continue indefinitely without repetition or pattern. Yes, that means it goes on forever! Many philomaths consider it a fun challenge to memorize as much of pi as possible.
  • As a constant number, pi will be the same (3.14…) for any circle of any size.
  • The use of pi dates back approximately 4,000 years to Babylonian calculations for the area of a circle.
  • Pi is also referred to as “Archimedes’ constant” in honor of the Greek mathematician who famously worked with the equation.

Are you a philomath? Celebrate Pi Day with coloring sheets, worksheets for middle-schoolers and high-schoolers, or reading more about pi. We’d love to hear your traditions and ideas for Pi Day! Share your thoughts with us on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook.