Tag: 5.G

The HAT tessellation

An Einstein aperiodic tile has just been discovered.  Find out what that means and why it is significant.  Plus – play with the tiles.  Do you want to tile your shower floor with these?  Could a tile setter pull this off?

Challenges for April Fools Day

This day is known for pranks and puzzles.   Try one of these 4 activities on April Fools Day. Ask students to analyze where I made my mistake        PerplexingProblem.pdf For members we have solutions. PerplexingProblem-solution.pdf      …

Daylight savings time

Will you wake up and go to sleep earlier or later on that Sunday?
What kind of chart or picture could you draw to help you compare before and after daylight savings time?
Will your Sunday seem longer or shorter?
Is daylight savings time still useful?

Before the holidays (16 activities)

We have tons (well, 16) of activities to bring to your class in this last week before the holiday break. Movies, science, art, cooking, economics, weather and the logic of calendars. Enjoy!

I need help raking my leaves

In this activity students see the inverse relationship between number of workers and time to complete the whole job. They graph hyperbolas and consider how long the extreme condition of zero people raking might take to complete the job.  

Inflation and the cost of gasoline

In 1980, a gallon of gas costs $1.22.  Today’s prices are a lot higher.  Is that because the price has gone up or because in 1980 you could buy a lot more with $1.22 than you can buy today?

Indigenous Peoples or Columbus Day

Sts learn a little history, question what they have learned earlier, and calculate how far off Columbus was from East India and his understanding of the actual circumference of the Earth.

Do teams that spend a lot win a lot?

In this activity students compare team wins with team salaries in the four major North American sports … the NBA, NFL, MLB and NHL.  Students use data from recent seasons to create scatter plots comparing wins and salaries for each sport

April Fool’s Day fun

Try one of these 4 activities on April Fools Day. Where did that extra dollar go? Mystical Mathematical Mind Reader; perplexing missing square in the triangle; and Robert Kaplinsky’s foil prank.

Activities for the Holiday break

Students work with the geodesic icosahedron of the Time’s Square Ball by slicing an icosahedron. How are properties valued according to their distance from GO in the game of Monopoly? Games with dice; puzzles; probabilities; and more.

Monopoly and summer games

In the board game, Monopoly, does a property’s distance from GO correlate to its rent when you land on it? Using Brian’s spread sheet (list of properties, distance from GO, rent and rent with properties), students create scatter plots.  They…

Largest s’more ever!

What is reasonable.?  How many marshmallows are in this recipe?  How many people could this cookie feed? How many marshmallows could you eat?