Students are taking their learning home, revisiting ideas and expanding each day. I'm thinking our "week" of YouCubed could easily turn into two weeks!
Here is a bit of info from the YouCubed website:
This week is about inspiring students through open, beautiful and creative math. We have chosen the different tasks so that students see math as a broad, interesting and visual subject that involves deep thinking. Students will learn important growth mindset messages that will help them feel confident, try harder all year, persist with open and difficult problems and embrace mistakes and challenge. All tasks are low floor and high ceiling – they are accessible to all students and they extend to high levels.
Here is an outline:
Day 1- Four 4's - Our brains are plastic and we can all achieve in math if we continue to return to ideas and push through. We can change our mindset about math.
Day 2 - Numbers made of dots - If we can work to cross our brain by seeing symbols as numbers and drawing at the same time then we will likely understand material better.
Task: Add three consecutive numbers to find the sum. Compare the sums until you see a sequence or pattern. Can you predict the sums without actually adding?
Day 3 - Folding geometry - Deep thinking is NOT fast thinking.
Task: Construct a sqaure (cut from edge to edge). You can fold and write on the paper as needed. Convince a friend or skeptic its a perfect square. Hint: Think about the properties of a square (degrees of angles, equal lengths of sides, equal diagonals, sides are parallel).
Day 5 - Seeing shapes grow - Perseverance - We looked for sequences, and patterns, rules. Then, students created their own.
Remember: If you want to see students in action, more photos are posted on the 'photo gallery' section of the website.