Today, Grade 4 had a sweet morning! We made 3D shapes with marshmallows!

We used toothpicks to represent the edges and the marshmallows to represent the vertices. Ms.O’Dwyer gave us clues and we had to work out which object to make. Then we had to record its name, as well as how many faces, edges and vertices that shape had.

Sometimes it was difficult to work out whether to build a prism or a pyramid. The hardest shape was the one with 24 edges, which turned out to be an octagonal prism. It was also tricky because the shape was always unsteady. The best thing was that after we finished making and recording, we got to eat the marshmallows! It was a very yummy lesson.

By Kota & Hanson

We did!

Last week, we enjoyed an investigation into area and perimeter. We were challenged to make two shapes with the same area of exactly 1 square meter but different perimeters. All our shapes looked different: triangles, hexagons, octagons and even an icosagon (20-sided polygon)! In each case, when we changed the form of the shape, the perimeter increased.

At the end of the task, we recorded our understanding in a mathematical reflection. Take a look at Kazuki’s excellent explanation of the task below.

Great mathematical thinking, Grade 4! It is wonderful to see you talking to each other, asking questions, checking measurements and solving problems!

We especially enjoyed working in groups to solve problems with matchsticks. Some of them were hard but our patterning skills helped us.

Have a look at our patterns video below!

By Na Youn, Hyun Seo & Kaopoon

Using compasses, rulers and protractors, we were challenged to construct 2D shapes, tessellations and patterns. We discovered the properties of circles, strategies for folding right-angled triangles and the mysteries of pentagons. The diagonals of pentagons hold many secrets!

In these hands-on inquiries, we developed problem-solving skills and a deeper understanding of geometry.

Here are some of our cool tessellations.

Ask us about rotation, reflection and translation!

Ask us about lines, angles and polygons!

Our timelines needed to include:

• an appropriate, accurate scale
• dates from 3000 B.C.E. to 2000 A.C.E
• 10 significant historical events

We were given a blank piece of paper and access to all information sources and measurement tools in our classroom. We needed all our Math and research skills to complete the task.

Here we are, hard at work:

Here are some of our finished timelines:

We were marked on understanding of scale, measurement skills, quality of information, presentation and cooperation. We assessed ourselves before Ms O’Dwyer added her comments.

What did you enjoy ?  What was the hardest part?  What did you learn from this task?

Now we can compare our timelines to better understand the order, span and key legacies of each civilisation.

This week, we have been looking at ancient architecture and learning about lines, angles and 2D shapes. We still use ancient Greek geometry in our art, architecture, music and games today.

In small groups, we hunted for geometry around our school. We earned a point for every mathematical legacy we could find, name and measure.

Here is a group of Geometry Hunters and their findings:

 
What did you learn about the properties of 2D shapes this week?

Why is mathematics important in architecture?

Why is mathematics important in music?

We’ve been looking at all the ways to think about, represent and calculate multiplication. We’ve used arrays of objects, drawings, number sentences and formal algorithms.

We’ve discovered that memorising our times tables really helps!

We’ve had speed competitions to find products, totals and differences. Each team works out their own strategies and the winners are constantly changing.

We’ve also had fun writing math problems about events from camp. For example, if there were 17 sticks and 12 marshmallows on each stick, how many marshmallows were there in total? We are very good at using all four operations (+, -, x, /) in word problems now.

Here we are solving each others’ word problems:

Some people in our class have such a good understanding of formal algorithms, they can work with algebra.

Stay tuned for interesting word problems and their solutions!

Add your own word problem for a friend to solve.

Today we finished our data investigation called Who Are We?  After collecting lots of data about the people in our class, we could finally answer the question: Who is the average Grade 4 student?

It was a little tricky to give a final answer. We had to organise our data and think carefully about whether to use the mean, median or mode for each category.

Would you like to meet the average student?  It turns out that no-one in our class fits the profile. We created Average Adam to be our imaginary friend and represent us all. Read  about his features below.

Average Adam

Average Adam is a boy. He is 9 years and 6 months old and his birthday is in December. He is 137.5cm tall and he can jump a distance of 126.5cm. Adam has been at BISS for 1 year and he travels to school by bus. He loves Maths and his strength is logical intelligence. Adam’s favorite colour is blue.

How do you compare with Adam? 

How are you similar? How are you different?

We’ve been writing questions, designing surveys and collecting lots of data about our classmates. We’ve learned to find and interpret the mean, median, mode & range of data sets. We’ve learned to use different graphs for different purposes. We’ve discovered the importance of scale and labels on our own graphs.

We’ve gathered data on our ages, learning strengths, birthday months, time at BISS and modes of transport. We even measured our heights and jump lengths. Here we are, busily collecting data:

In the end, we hope to describe our class composition and even answer the question: Who is the average Grade 4 student?

Stay tuned for our findings!

By Dave

What a wonderful comment! It describes a huge effort and a great achievement.

Congratulations on your progress in Mathematics, Dave!  You have been working hard to understand place value in large numbers. Your friends and teachers are very proud of you. Keep sharing your thoughts and feelings with us.

from Ms Y., Ms O’Dwyer & all your Grade 4 friends