Comenius-School Partnership 2011-2013:
Living Maths
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Week of “living maths”
Kaethe-Kollwitz-School Giessen
Germany
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Content of Maths Activities
• Awareness of beer
mats on the body
• Bingo
• Clapping the
multiplikation table
•Coins (Euro)
• Confidental
Messages
• Dye Distribution
• from rectnalge to
trangle
•orms and figures
• Handcuffs and
picture frames
•Leonardo Bridge
• Let´s do math with
your body
•Measure
• Pentominos
• Puzzles
• Rallye
•Squares
• Tangram
• Twenty wins
• Yacht Race
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Tangram Year1
Tangrams are an ancient
Chinese puzzle game.
With only seven shapes, a
square, a parallelogram,
and five triangles, various
shapes and figures can be
formed.
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Tangram
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Tangram
All parts must be used, they must touch but
they must not overlap.
Materials: Tangram puzzle pieces and figures
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Animal calculation
• Animal calculation is a
mathematics game which
practices mental arithmetic.
• There are two different
teams, the yellow team and
the red team. Every child gets
a card with an animal. There
are always two cards with the
same animal, but with a
different coloured background.
All pupils who have a yellow
card are in the “yellow team”,
all pupils which have a red
card are in the “red team”.
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• Then the teacher (or a child who
isn’t participating in the game)
says a calculation, but instead of
saying the result he or she says
the name of one of the animals.
• For example: 3 + 4 = elephant
• Now only the two children who
have the card with the called
animal, in our example the
elephant, are allowed to give the
answer.
• The child who gives the right
answer at first gets a point for his
team (the yellow or the red one).
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•
When we did the game with the
invited classes (1b and 1c), the
children of class 1a said the
calculations, our visitors were the
players who played in two teams.
• The children of class 1a had invented
calculations and had written them on
cards a few days ago. So these pupils
had to set the calculations to the
visitors. At first they drew a card with
a calculation and a card with an
animal (additional materials), then
they set the calculation / task to the
visitors.
Materials:
Cards with pictures of animals in two
different colours
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Bingo Year 1
The game leader calls an
addition task with an
answer.
from 1 to 9.
Those who find the result
circle this field at their
bingo card.
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The one who
could circle first three
results in a row is the
“Bingo King”.
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Bingo
Materials:
Bingo cards and pencils or
board and chalk
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Twenty wins Year 1
A number which was circled by a
player cannot be used any more
by the opponent. In this game a
player must not only try to reach
20 themselves, but
must
also
prevent
their
opponent from reaching 20
before them.
Materials:
board, coloured chalk or paper,
coloured pencils
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Twenty wins
The figures from 1 to 9 are
written up some distance from
each other on the board or on
paper. Two students come to
the board or play together at
their table. Everybody receives
a different coloured chalk.
Taking
turns everyone may encircle a
number, add these figures to
the sum of the previous figures
and try to achieve the result
20.
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Rallye Year 1
Four sums are written on the blackboard.
Each sum belongs to one group of
pupils. Example:
Group I
32
Group II
28
Group III
64
Group IV
56
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Rallye
The first student in each
group gets a piece of chalk
and – after the start sign –
runs to the blackboard
and writes a result under
her/his group that equals
the sum.
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Rallye
Example:
I
32
5x6+2
II
28
7x4
III
64
70-6
IV
56
7x8
Then she/he runs back to
the group and hands the
chalk over to another group
member. The relay ends
after 5 minutes. Winner is
the group with the highest
number of correct results.
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Monster calculation Year 1
• Monster calculation is a
mathematics game which
practices mental arithmetic.
• For the game you need two
players, it is also useful to have a
game leader. The leader has a
small bag with about 40 cards (30
cards with numbers from 0 to 9
and 10 cards with pictures of
different monsters).
• Object of the game is to get 20
points in one round (but not
more than twenty). To achieve
this objective, the players have to
draw cards from the bag and to
add up the numbers if possible.
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Monster calculation
• One of the two players starts. If
his / her first card is a number,
the player is allowed to go on and
to draw a second card. If this card
is a number, too, the player has to
add up the number to the first
one. The player is able to draw a
third, fourth, fifth… card, too. But
if he/she draws a monster, all
points are lost (0 points). If
he/she gets more then twenty
points, all points are lost, too. So
the player has to decide after
every draw if he/she runs the risk
and draws another card or if
he/she stops and keeps the
points.
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Monster calculation
40 or more cards with numbers (ca. ¾)
and monsters (ca. ¼) a small bag for the
cards chips (small plates, stones…) for
the winner of a round
• Then it’s the turn of the
second player. He/she knows
the result of the first player
and can stop, when he/she has
more points then the first
player. After every round the
players match their points. The
player who has achieved more
points gets a chip ore
something else (in our case we
had small plates like
pokerchips)
• After every round the
beginning player changes. All
points from the previous
round are deleted.
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Squares and Pentominoes Year 2
Squares:
The pupils should build figures with
3/4/5 squares.
Pentominoes:
The pupils should fill a squared sheet
of paper with the pentominoes.
3 different sizes, many different
possibilities.
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Squares and Pentominoes
We´ve had 3 stations for the squares
and 3 stations for the pentominoes.
All of them have been managed by
pupils of our second grade.
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Squares and Pentominoes
Two other classes of the
second grade visited us
to work at the stations.
We also visited the two
other classes to work
with their stations.
Materials:
squares, pentominoes
(thick
coloured paper), squared
paper
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Pentominoes
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Pentominoes
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Yacht Race Year 2
The children explained to
other the properties of
squares, rectangles and
triangles.
The children ordered the
forms in squares, rectangles
and triangles.
They folded the shapes to
make a boat.
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Yacht Race
Material:
rectangles, squares,
triangles, paper, scissors,
template for folding, pens
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Forms and Figures Year 3
The children cut squares into
rectangles, small
squares and different triangles.
The children added these
shapes together to make
pictures and then stuck them
down.
At last they coloured
their pictures.
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Forms and figures
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Forms and figures
Materials:
squares (green, pink,
yellow, blue), scissors,
glue, white sheets,
presentations
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Measure, year 2
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Measure
• Measure parts of your
body in 7 stations.
• Go to all stations and take
one of a lot of tapemeasures.
• 1. Measure your height.
• 2.Measure your arms, if
you stretch them both to
the sides.
• 3.Measure the length of
your foot.
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Measure
• 4. Measure the thick of
your thumb.
• 5.Measure from your
elbow to your stretched
longest finger.
• 6.Measure one of your
steps.
• 7. Measure from your
thumb to your finger
pointer.
• Write all results in your
one little book.
Material: tape-measures, little body books,
pencils
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Coins (Euro) Year 3
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Coins
• Look at every coin and
compare them. Look at
your work sheet.
• Work in groups or with
a partner.
• 1.How big is the coin?
• 2. Describe the colour
of the coin.
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Coins
• 3. What’s the weight of
the coin?
• 4. Which coin is
magnetic?
• 5. Make a rubbing of the
coin.
Material: a lot of special tape-measures, little body books for all children, pencils
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Dye Distribution Year 3
Activity:
The children work in pairs. Two
children together get a bag with 10
coloured bricks in it. The colours of
the bricks are blue and red. The
children have to find out, how many
bricks of each colour are in the bag,
but they are not allowed to look into
the bag.
They have to take out one of the
bricks and list the colour in a table.
Then they put the brick back into
the bag and take another one. They
have to repeat this 30 times.
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Dye Distribution
The next step is to consider how
many bricks of each colour are in
the bag and note the guess down.
At last they have to compare their
guess with the content of the bag.
Materials:
Half the number of bags than the
number of children in the class
10 different coloured (two colours)
bricks for each bag
Sheet of paper and a pencil so that
the children can note things down
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Building a Leonardo Bridge Year 3
Building the bridge of
Leonardo da Vinci
Children get twelve equal
pieces of wood( length 12
cm, width 3 cm). They have
to think about a
construction of a bridge.
First they can try on their
own. If they need help, they
can have a look at a
construction plan.
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Puzzles
Groups with 2-4 pupils
They children have to find
how to arrange the
pieces in a Dice, Puzzle,
“V”, “T”, Pyramid and
Tangram
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Puzzles
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Puzzles
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Puzzles
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Confidential Messages Year 4
• If the code is "E“, you
have to place “E” under
"A". Now words can be
encoded.
• Vice versa the students
can encode words
themselves.
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Confidential Messages
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Confidential Messages
Material:
Model:
• Cut our circle and
square.
• Cut a hole in each case
• hole - in the middle.
• Connect both parts with
a clip.
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Handcuffs and picture frames
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Handcuffs and picture frames
The pupils asked the
children:
Think about: What can you
do with 2 paper stripes?
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Handcuffs and picture frames
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Handcuffs and picture frames
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Let´s do math with your body, year 4
• Work with a partner.
• Stand with your back
right in front of a wall.
Now your partner marks
your body height with a
pencil on the wall.
• Measure with a string
your height.
• Cut off the string.
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Let´s do math with your body
Find answers to the following
questions:
• Stretch your arms to both sides.
Hold an end of the string in each
hand.
• - Is your height almost the same
as the distance between your
finger tips when your arms are
stretched?
•
• - How often can you wrap the
same string around your head?
• Guess before trying out.
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• Wrap a piece of string one time around
your neck.
• - How often can you wrap the same
string around your wrist?
• -Is your neck or your wrist bigger?
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Let´s do math with your body
• Measure other parts of
your body.
• i.e. Measure the length
of your foot. How often
does this string fit
around your wrist?
• You can also measure
the parts of the body of
your mom, dad,
friends…etc.
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Let´s do math with your body
• Compare the results of
your measurements.
• Are there similarities
between adults and
children?
• What are the differences?
Materials:
String i.e. wool, pencil, wall,
pair of scissors
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From the rectangle to the triangle
Year 4
The right lower corner is folded now.
Therefore fold the right lower corner
so, that the corner lies on the centre
line and the crease is exactly in the
left corner.
After that fold the left corner up.
You can already see the triangle.
Now you only have to fold the small
triangle, which is left, to the back.
You receive an equilateral triangle.
Materials: paper
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From the rectangle to the triangle
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From the rectangle to the triangle
By trying out the students solve the
problems:
Fold an equilateral triangle out of a
rectangle.
Solution:
By folding the sheet four times the
students receive the equilateral
triangle.
Fold the long edges of the rectangle
onto each other.
Unfold the sheet again. Now you can
see a line in the middle of the sheet
(where it has been folded)
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From the rectangle to the triangle
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Awareness of beer mats on the body
Year 4
Work with a partner
• One partner lies down on
the floor
• A beer mat will be placed
on different parts of the
body with light pressure
• The partner lying on the
floor should remember
the series of the touched
body parts.
• Materials: Beer mats
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Awareness of beer mats on the body
Questions:
• How many series can
the pupils remember?
(Start with one beer
mat, then increase the
amount of the beer
mats, 2, 3, 4,….)
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Awareness of beer mats on the body
• How many beer mats
do you need to cover
the whole body of your
partner?
• First estimate!
• Then try and find out!
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Clapping the multiplication table
Free walking in the classroom
One multiplication series will be
decided (for example: 1x4)
The pupils walk through the room
and count every step they take
loud: 1, 2, 3, - when 4,( 8, 12, 16,
20, 24, 28, 32, 36, 40) they also
have to clap into their hands.
Variations: Other
multiplication series.
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Kaethe-Kollwitz-School
Giessen, Germany
March 2013
www.kks-giessen.de