Anno Mitsumasa challenges readers with enticing mathematics in the context of a charming story about a young man and the magic seeds that provide him with the means and inspiration to become an industrious - and generous - farmer. Each math question is expressed as part of the text. Readers must use addition and subtraction to arrive at the correct answer, which is pictured as part of the graceful, amusing watercolor illustrations. (Ages 7-10)

The reader is asked to perform a series of mathematical operations integrated into the story of a lazy man who plants magic seeds and reaps an increasingly abundant harvest.