Geometry has always been one of the most fun units in first-grade math. We took this unit and Common-Cored it up to make it more rigorous, but we kept the fun!
The standards that we worked with are 1.G.1 and 1.G.2:
the composite shape.
We pulled out every kind of manipulative we had and came up with activities for them!
1) One of the kids' favorites was building the shapes out of playdoh and toothpicks! Here are some of the 2D shapes we created!
2) "Shape Snack!" Students brought in snacks that were in 2D and 3D shapes. I provided a list for parents, but I loved the creativity that our families have! One parent told me they were walking around the grocery store for 15 min, and their child was naming what kind of shapes different food was. I love how into it they were getting!
The standards that we worked with are 1.G.1 and 1.G.2:
1. Distinguish between defining attributes (e.g., triangles are closed and
three-sided) versus non-defining attributes (e.g., color, orientation,
overall size); build and draw shapes to possess defining attributes.
2. Compose two-dimensional shapes or three-dimensional shapes
to create a composite shape, and compose new shapes from
the composite shape.
We pulled out every kind of manipulative we had and came up with activities for them!
1) One of the kids' favorites was building the shapes out of playdoh and toothpicks! Here are some of the 2D shapes we created!
Tip: You have to have larger vertices made out of the playdoh, or they will fall apart too easily, and the kids get frustrated!
And... don't buy 6000 toothpicks! 1 box of 1000 was way more than enough!
(Learned that one the hard way!) #overachiever
And in Common core fashion, we wrote on a recording sheet to explain what we knew about our shapes!
There is a LOT of writing in this unit!
I made a point of explaining that the playdoh balls were called vertices or corners. They picked u;p the terms pretty quickly!
We did this a few days later using 3D shapes.
2) "Shape Snack!" Students brought in snacks that were in 2D and 3D shapes. I provided a list for parents, but I loved the creativity that our families have! One parent told me they were walking around the grocery store for 15 min, and their child was naming what kind of shapes different food was. I love how into it they were getting!
The kids all brought in food "shapes," and we ate them as a snack!
And of course, writing to tell me about what they ate! We had so much food we did this all week! And... wrote about it every time! By the end of the week, I was getting some GREAT sentences! (I made them write a sentence before they could dig in! #willbeengagedforfood)
The super cutest thing about it all? They kept on talking about what shapes they were eating at lunch and snacks!
3) Have fun with it!
We watched "Spookly the Square Pumpkin."
this led us to a debate about whether or not he was indeed a square! (lol!)
We decided that they called him a square because his face was a square- but he was really a cube! Nice segway into the faces on a 3D shape! I love it when the stars align for these teachable moments!
And we made Amy Lemons cute little Owl Craftivity!
We discussed the shapes it takes to make the owl. This fit wonderfully into our Owl Unit we are working on in reading and Science! I found this Red Ribbon Week display to put on our bulletin board!
It is from First Grade O.W.L.S
We finished up with daily building and tangrams task cards to make our composite shapes! It was a lot of fun Hands-on activities! The students were so excited to have math every day, they learned a ton, so I could not be happier!
All of these activities are in my unit.
I included every manipulative I could and wrote assessments to end each of the standards. I also added a page of technology links and a sample lesson plan to explain how I used it!
I hope you have a great night!
.png)
