Wet Weather Recess Symmetry

Wet weather recess times can be a great opportunity for children to play and explore mathematical concepts. 

One of the options children have been choosing to do is to create half or a quarter of a symmetrical shape / pattern. Then, they give it to a classmate to see if they can continue making the shape symmetrically.





Here is a design a student created and gave to a classmate:

   








Identifying the two lines of symmetry, the classmate was then able to complete the shape:

 

Another example:

.....and what their classmate created:

Those choosing to do this during their wet weather indoor recess times have really been enjoying trying to create challenging shapes:

Exploring the Properties of Quadrilaterals

We have been exploring the properties of quadrilaterals. To help us find out what properties exist, we used a Venn diagram with a partner to compare the parallelogram and trapezium.

We then shared our ideas together as a class and came up collectively with the following:

This was a useful learning strategy to help all of us see different properties we can think about when exploring polygons. As children shared their ideas, they helped others to understand by teaching us what they meant.

We then chose two quadrilaterals and created a Venn diagram to compare their properties.  After comparing, we then evaluated whether we thought the two quadrilaterals had a close or a distant relationship and why.

There was, of course, a marked growth in understanding and the children reflected on how proud they felt in being able to find so many connections.

Investigating Triangles

We have been exploring our central idea:

Shapes have got close or distant relationships. and combining this with our other central idea:    When angles co-exist, connections and relationships are formed.


To help us deepen our understandings of both, we are investigating triangles. They are a great way to help children see the wonders of maths with their connections and relationships. They can spark interesting wonderings for children to take ownership in creating and enquiring into. 

We began in small groups.  Each group shared their understandings of different types of triangles and recorded these on chart paper. 

Lots of interesting prior knowledge was shared amongst the groups and wonderings already began sparking and many started trying to find these out together.  It also served as a great pre-assessment to see where our understandings were regarding the properties and connections triangles have. 

Students chose to add some of their wonderings to our poster for either themselves or others to enquire into during our investigations:

To help raise the engagement into triangles, we shared our wonderings and then children had time to choose one or more that they found interesting and had time trying to find out.

One interesting wondering posed was whether this shape was a triangle or not:

The children examining this wanted the whole class to think about it as they were divided. 

So, we found out who in our class thought it was a triangle and or didn't. We were about 50-50 on this.

We listened to the reasons of those who felt it wasn't a triangle and then from those who thought it was.

We didn't come to a definite answer and we thought that in itself is alright. What we did value was that we all used our knowledge to develop reasoning skills which we often discuss is an important element of mathematical thinking.

We then used the think-pair-share strategy to make a list of things we know about triangles using the key concept form.

When we got to the whole class sharing, other interesting wonderings are also shared and these were added to our wonderings poster to explore later.