If you have a set of cubes for your classroom, this would make a great group hands-on project. Its an old puzzle but the activity deserves a revisit. Below are two straight-on images of my stack of blocks. Can you…
Point of view
Tag: 5th
Perseid meteor shower
Catching a productive meteor shower can be a stunning experience. On the evenings and mornings of August 11th and 12th there could be a very good show. A nearly new moon will leave the night sky dark. Depending on the…
“Wild Boars” soccer team rescue – Incredible
Can you imagine being stuck in the dark for such a long time? How do all of the numbers play out? In this activity, students get a chance to talk about the experience of this ordeal while calculating usual rates…
Really big beach towel
Act One: Check out this beach towel! What do you wonder? What would you like to know? Miami artist, Misael Soto (pictured on the left below), created this giant art project to make a statement about people sharing territory at the beach.…
World Cup draw
This is part II of our reflections on the World Cup games. Part I, World Cup rankings, explained and let students practice with the formula and weighting that is used to establish each country’s team rank. This second activity deals with…
Fibonacci coloring
Let your students simply enjoy coloring our designs or artistically play with the whole creation of Φ designs. Simply coloring our Fibonacci patterns might allow students to ponder the Fibonacci sequence (while they learn more about its beauty) and just…
World Cup rankings
In December soccer teams with the strongest world rankings were chosen to play in the once-every-4-years World Cup. The World Cup competition has just begun and will continue through July 15th. The team rankings are calculated in a pretty complex…
Impress your parents at dinner
This activity is the first in our series on mental math tricks. Let your students develop their own individual way of mentally multiplying by 0.5, 5, 50, 500, and so on. We have a little practice and a requirement for…
Will Damarious Randall have to pay big?
Warriors won the NBA Championships. Randall won’t have to buy jerseys! The Cleveland Brown’s safety player, Damarious Randall, posted this tweet. Its been very popular and retweeted a lot. How much might he have to fork out for jerseys? Let’s…
How much pee is in that pool?
After chlorination, it has been hard to measure the quantity of pollutants in pool water. A Canadian chemist, Xing-Fang Li, has found a marker for urine that chlorine doesn’t disguise. In this activity, students calculate volume of several pools, change that…
Memorial Day 2018
This Monday Americans will celebrate Memorial Day. Who are we honoring? How did the holiday come about? Isn’t Memorial Day usually on May 30th? Students learn a little about the history of the holiday, analyze the possibilities and patterns for when…
More eruptions on Hawai’i’s Kilauea
The Volcano Kilauea is continuing to spew molten lava and ash on the island of Hawai’i. This volcano is on the tip of the southern most Hawaiian Island. Is that significant? In this activity students note the descending ages of…
Who had the greatest NBA season ever?
In 2017 Russel Westbrook had one of the most dominating seasons ever, averaging a trip!e double per game. James Harden lit up the league in 2018 and is considered the favorite for MVP. Or what about Stephen Curry and his…
Mother’s Day is coming up
Mother’s Day by the numbers – Mother’s Day is right around the corner and this means big business for the greeting card and floral industries. Let your students practice averages, percents, and large numbers while they analyze the statistics on Mother’s…
Longest NHL overtime games in history
Game one of the 2013 Stanley Cup between the Bruins and Blackhawks went into 3 overtimes. People stayed up way too late to watch the conclusion. The teams played 112 minutes and eight seconds of game time. The game went…