Bowland
Mystery Tours – Plan Your Tour
Everyone loves a vacation and a set of three activities has groups planning a tour of the U.K. using given distance, time, and price data. They solve a variety of problems related to the trip and produce a report on the success of the trip.
Illustrative Mathematics
Overlapping Rectangle
Challenge young mathematicians' ability to compose and decompose shapes with this fun geometry puzzle. The goal is simple, locate all of the rectangles shown in a picture of three overlapping rectangles. Perform this activity as a whole...
Curated OER
Action-Reaction! Rocket
Students construct a rocket from a balloon propelled along a guide string. They use this model to learn about Newton's three laws of motion, examining the effect of different forces on the motion of the rocket. They measure the distance...
Curated OER
Swinging Pendulum
Students engage in an activity which demonstrates how potential energy (PE) can be converted to kinetic energy (KE) and back again. Given a pendulum height, students calculate and predict how fast the pendulum will swing by understanding...
Teach Engineering
Stormy Skies
Young meteorologists examine the four main types of weather fronts and how they appear on a weather map. Participants learn about the difference between the types of weather fronts along with their distinguishing features. A...
PEGAMES.org
Duck Duels
If you're stuck inside on a rainy day for PE, or just want to give your class a body break, try out this fun game involving quick mental math and movement. Waddling around the classroom as ducks, learners compete in math duels, trying to...
Curated OER
The Game is Afoot - A Study of Sherlock Holmes
Mystery is an exciting genre for young readers to investigate. The plots are so intriguing! Here is a series of lessons featuring Sherlock Holmes stories that invite learners to enter the world of the mystery genre. Based on what they...
Early Childhood Education
Shape It Up!
The best way to understand shapes is to make them. Young geometers explore basic shapes through a variety of gross motor and fine motor activities. Shape sorting, singing songs about shapes, and eating shape snacks are just a few of the...
California Academy of Science
Moons in Comparison
Just how big is Earth's moon? With a hands-on simulation, scholars use Play-Doh to model the sizes of the planets Earth, Mars, Jupiter, and their moons. They make predictions as a class, work together to make their models, and discuss...
Illustrative Mathematics
Sammy's Chipmunk and Squirrel Observations
Here is a fun project. Sammy observes a chipmunk and a squirrel to see how many holes each needs in order to stash the same number of acorns. Scholars could find the answer algebraically or create a table to analyze the problem in...
Houston Area Calculus Teachers
Polynomial Graphing
Your AP Calculus learners probably have their ID numbers memorized, but have they tried graphing them? Pique your pupils' interest by asking each to create a unique polynomial function based on their ID numbers, and then analyze the...
Mathed Up!
Fractions, Decimals, and Percentages
After watching a video on making conversions, young mathematicians solve 16 math problems that involve making conversions of fractions to decimals and percents, decimals to fractions and percents, and percents to fractions and decimals.
Curated OER
Water Down the Drain
Did you know that leaky faucets waste $10 million worth of water? Conservationists perform an experiment and draw best-fit lines to explore how the US Geological Society determined this value.
California Mathematics Project
Model Solar System
The sun's diameter is 864,337 miles—challenge learners to create a scale model of the solar system that fits in your classroom. Scholars make conversions and work with scientific notation as they create the scale model.
College Board
AP Calculus: Slope Fields
Ready to field questions about slope fields? An article on AP® Calculus teaching methods describes how to teach about slope fields to solve differential equations. It gives some sample problems to consider with the class and how to...
Concord Consortium
Strings and Areas
You'd be surprised what you can do with a string! The constraint is the length of string, and the task is to maximize area. Given a series of composite shapes, learners must create a formula for the maximum area for a specified...
Radford University
Right Triangle Applications: Lessons 1 and 2
Use right triangles for more than just mathematical problems. The first two lessons of a unit ask pupils determine distances between cities by using the Pythagorean Theorem and a map. To cement understanding, learners use trigonometric...
University of Arkansas
Twizzling Fractions
Using food as a manipulative is one of the best ways to incorporate hands-on learning in the classroom. This hands-on approach allows young mathematicians to compare, order, and identify fractions with the use of Twizzlers® and fraction...
Curated OER
Geometric Pictures of One Half
A learning task that involves creative ways of thinking permits children to use paper models as a way to visualize the fraction one-half. Learners can fold or cut their models in such a way that the unshaded regions, and shaded regions...
Curated OER
Solidly Platonic
When they do, they learn. Using this resource, young mathematicians learn about platonic solids by actually building, touching, and examining the shapes. They connect their observations about the shapes to Euler's formula.
Curated OER
Ratios, Unit Rates, and Proportions
Explore the concept of ratios, unit rates, and proportions. Learners convert fractions and percents to decimals. They discuss rates and where they can be found in the real world. A hands-on experiment and numerous flash cards and...
NY Learns
Investigation - What's in the Bag?
If you have or can create a set of tiles, numbered one through eight, then you can implement this hands-on lesson about probability models. Individuals draw a tile from a bag, record its number, and then return it to the bag. They...
Curated OER
Introduction to Conics
Just exactly where does the name conic come from? This brief hands-on exploration explains it all. Have your class cut cones to create their own conics, then assess their understanding with a few identification problems. Consider making...
Curated OER
Close Enough?
Students examine how navigation is based on mathematics and how making a mistake in measuring an angle could have an impact on a target. They observe a teacher-led lecture, use a calculator to complete two worksheets, and participate in...