Summary of lesson plan:
This is the second of two lesson plans that allows students to explore the concept of volume. They will understand that volume is the amount of space a 3D object takes up.
Australian Curriculum Links:
- Year 4: Compare objects using familiar metric units of area and volume (ACMMG290).
- Year 5: Choose appropriate units of measurement for length, area, volume, capacity and mass (ACMMG108)
Lesson plan sequence:
Introduction:
- Show the candy problems (Resource document below) and ask “Which candy box would you buy?”(For other candy problems – draw three different boxes that have the same volume)
- Ask students to raise hands to vote for A-B-C and record as a tally.
- Discuss with children why they chose the box that they chose? Did the size impact their decision? Do they think they all hold different amounts of candy?
- Explain to students that the candy boxes hold the exact same amount of candy. As a class work out the volume.
- Students will realise that the size of an object can sometimes be misleading.
- Now ask the question: “How does understanding volume help you to make choices in the real world?”
- Display: http://www.teacherled.com/resources/cuboidexplode/cuboidexplodeload.html
- Have students calculate the area of each of the shapes. Press the tool in the top left corner to open up the shape. This will allow students to see hidden blocks. Discuss different ways we can calculate volume instead of using the formula. Practice counting how many blocks there are in the shape. Count 1 by 1, row by row, column by column etc…
Body:
- Students can practice making their own candy box problems. They will choose a volume e.g: 20cm3, they will find 3 different ways of representing that volume.
- Problem: Cadbury makes chocolates that are 1cm3 in size and they want your help to design a container to pack them into. They want 20 chocolates in each box. What might the box look like? What if they wanted 2 or 3 layers? If they wanted to make jumbo boxes of 50 chocolates what is the best way to package them?
- If students finish early they can explore volume using the following interactive sites. The learnalberta link has a good printable activity they can use.
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Conclusion:
- Bring students back to floor for discussion and lead into assessment for the session.
Assessment:
- Students to use laptops (if available) to document their learning activity and progress. They can place these photos into a pages document or onto the ComicLife program. They will write a brief description about the task and what they understand about volume. They can self-assess themselves and give themselves a grade on how well they think they worked and how well they understand the topic.
Resources:
[wpfp-link]
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