Monthly Archives: January 2018

339. Broken rotation

This is a quick post following a discussion in the office today. The prompt was a colleague asking “How do you teach rotation to a child with two broken arms?”

The last ‘child’ I taught with two broken arms was a sixth former and it involved profuse photocopying of notes.

But back to the problem. You could cut out shapes and rotate them on a gridded whiteboard. The student could get a feel for what was going on and be part of the whiteboard Q& A session. For the main classwork, photocopy the worksheet or textbook and increase it to A3. Make a second colour copy and cut out the shapes in the questions. The student can then move these into the correct places to answer the questions. The work could then be photographed, emailled to the teacher or printed out.

Of course I do mean use a phone to take a picture, because it’ll take more than two broken arms to stop a teenager using their mobile phone.

(BTW I’m not making light of the student’s problem. It’s important we think around these issues to ensure all students can access the curriculum)

338. Grappling with graphs

Have you noticed that textbooks are okay with graphs, until you need some interpreting graphs questions?

Image Credit: trustedreviews

I thought that mobile phone tariffs would be a good starting point for comparing fixed charges and rates. Using the iPhone X as a starting point, I’ve put together a discussion starter and couple of additional questions. All the tariffs are actual offers available at the time of writing.

You could start by looking at the graph and asking students what they notice, you could give them the tariffs and ask them to generate graphs or you could give them the data and ask them to plot the graph and derive the tariffs. It’s up to you!

The graph is deliberately vague so that students can discuss trends without getting obsessed by the detail of the numbers. Everything is downloadable below.

iphone X tariff graph

Iphone X mini investigation

Interpreting graphs

 

337. Surreal symmetry

I stumbled across this splendid website and Instagram feed through an article in ‘The Guardian’ newspaper:
Accidentally Wes Anderson
The site owner has collected together images of buildings that look like they could be in a Wes Anderson film.

Image Credit: #accidentallywesanderson

The result is a stunning collection of images of symmetrical architecture from around the world. The photos could be used as a starting point for a discussion on symmetry, shape or the mathematics of the world around us.