For about two weeks my mentor teacher and I had been collecting other peoples "trash" aka toilet paper rolls and small boxes. (Big thanks to everyone who gave me supplies!!)
The materials included:
1box- prism
4 toilet paper rolls- cylinder
1 balloon- sphere
1 paper cone- cone
scissors
tape
glue
ruler
I had been excited about this project for a while and it worked out perfectly that this day would be my evaluation day! My mentor teacher allowed me to plan and teach this project all by myself. She said that she would be in the classroom and help out while I led it. Unfortunately she got sick and I got a text the night before saying that she wouldn't be in class the day of the project. After I mild panic attack I realized that I could do it by myself and the students would be great (I told myself over and over).
I was nervous about doing group work with my classroom because I had never done it before. Fortunately my first class is very well behaved and worked amazing together! I only had a couple of students complain at first about their partner but once they started measuring they got into the project and moved past that. All of the students were on task and sharing the roles equally. Some measured while the other plugged the numbers into the formula. They all used their creativity!! Some were standing, sitting, flexing, tall, short, or even had earrings!
Only a couple of groups had enough tin foil to cover their robots. We talked about why and discovered that tin foil crinkles up so this was less material for them to use. Many of the students didn't realize that the tin foil needed to be carefully and precisely put on the robots. Many of them wrapped the prism like a gift. This left material overlapping which we discussed that this wasn't calculated in finding surface area.
I think doing hands on activities with students helps them better understand how math is used in the real world. I believe they now have a better understanding of surface area. Working with 3D shapes in class helped them visualize a base or side. They had seen problems on a worksheet that are kind of hard to picture a 3D figure on a 2D piece of paper. My students are used to being told exactly what to do. With a topic like surface area, there is pretty much only one way to solve a problem. By giving them freedom to measure things how they wanted, it helped them problem solve. While students were covering their tin man they realized they had to be very precise. I let them figure this out themselves because if I had told them, they wouldn't have understood exactly why. This presented themselves with a challenge that they had to work through and come up with a solution. This idea of perseverance and problem solving is my goal for my classes this year.
I had them fill out a reflection sheet which asked questions like what was the hardest/easiest part and what would you have done differently next time. Overall, the project was greater than I could have ever imagined. Their robots are displayed in our classroom :)
Debbie Cakes and Mighty Bones
I think this sounds like a great project! Did you guys come up with the idea on your own or did you get inspired from somewhere (and if so, where from?) I think it's great that you have such a cooperative class to work with. I've found that one of our challenges is that we cannot do fun activities like this with our kids because they don't work well when put into groups and get distracted very easily. I'm glad you get to experience such things!
ReplyDeleteI loved reading this. This is such a great idea for a fun project. Did they understand the concept better at the end of the day? I wish we could do fun projects like this everyday.
ReplyDeleteSound like a great hands on learning experience
ReplyDeleteI am also curious if this helped them better understand and apply the concepts? Did you see positive results on their performance assessments? (I remembered you mentioning that you and your teacher used standards based grading) Also I am wondering if it is better to tell them ahead of time that you need to minimize the amount of foil as you cover the parts of the man in order to gain a more accurate answer or do you let them discover it like what happened when your students were overlapping the foil.
ReplyDeleteI am probably going to steal this! I hope you don't mind! (if you do, you can tell me because my geometry class won't be doing surface area until November)
That sounds like a great project! I’m sure your students loved it. I like that you thought of a creative way to get your class engaged in a topic that could just as easily been taught with them sitting at their desks taking note or doing a worksheet. I think that students really remember concepts when they do projects such as these. Also, I like how this project gave them an example of how math is applied in real life situations.
ReplyDeleteI love hearing about these highs -- and you should savor these. Share any other successes you have - including materials so others can try in their classes. This applies to everyone, not just Kim (even though I am commenting on her blog).
ReplyDeleteI got it from a teachers blog at http://misscalculate.blogspot.com/2012/04/surface-area-tin-man-project.html
ReplyDeleteI asked them if they could decribe it better and they could! It was more than just a formula. It also helped them understand the difference between why area is squared and volume is cubed! We did this project after the assessment because of observations but I think it would be a good idea to do it before a test. I'll do that next time! Steal away!