CLIL Activities on Math by Cristian Bastidas, Jessica Rodriguez, Ricardo Yepes
Problem solving activity: Let’s form a plant!
Instructions:
1. Today we are going to learn the parts of a plant.
Please form groups of three.
2. Take a look at the following image, it describes
the main parts of a plant:
Taken and adapted from: https://miro.medium.com/max/3368/1*u7m4cW6MXRV-o9uqA04FKg.jpeg
3. Taking into account the information presented in that image, you are going to form a plant using different pieces.
2. 4. They contain
the main parts of a plant: flower pot, roots, stem, leaves and flowers. Take a
look at them:
5. Behind each
piece, there is the name of the part of the plant, so you need to remember the
first image you saw.
6. The final result should follow this blueprint:
7. Look, they have
geometric shapes. The piece of the flower looks like an oval. It has the form
of an egg. The flowerpot and the stem
look like a rectangle. Which has four sides and has the form of a table. The
shapes of the leaves on the left look like trapezoids. They have two parallel
sides. They have the form of a kite. The shapes of the leaves on the right look
like pentagons. They have five straight sides. They have the form of a house.
8. Take into account
the shapes of the pieces, so you can put them together easily.
9. You will receive two pieces of paper where
you will find the parts of a puzzle.
10. Once you have them, cut the pieces with your
scissors very carefully.
11. Now, watch again the blueprint.
12. Try to organize the pieces according to the
blueprint.
13. You have ten
minutes to finish the activity. The first group that ends will win.
a. The Answer Key
(in color)
The following
image:
Taken and adapted from: https://www.homestratosphere.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/plant-structure.jpg
b. The purpose of
the activity making at least 3 connections with the base Reading (Ch.11
Brewer)
- This activity helps children of six and eight years of age to experience with geometric shapes such as rectangles (flower pot), trapezoids and pentagons (leaves) and ovals (flower).
- This activity encourages children to learn the name, form, color and function of the parts of a plant as well as the way they relate to each other.
- According to Swinson (2019), activities with puzzles develop critical-thinking skills in children, which prepare them to solve real problems when they grow. Puzzles can also help children with pattern recognition, memory, and functions. And are effective for both gross and fine motor skills. Finally, the manipulation of puzzles’ pieces help children construct both mentally and physically relations between concepts.
- This activity allows children to manipulate objects (parts of the plant) and then reflect on the results (the way a plant is structured).
Activity: My
plant timeline!
The central
activity is to represent the data collected over a month on a timeline.
However, this activity requires a previous activity related to this calendar:
Taken and adapted from: https://www.axnent.com/november-2020-calendar-cute/
So, the idea is
to encourage all the kids in the class to plant a bean seed (it can be at home,
or in the school garden) and mark the evolution of their plants on the calendar
according to the instructions given.
Then, the
activity in class is that all the children take their calendar and record the
evolution of their plant on this timeline:
Instructions:
- Look at your calendar
and identify the days in which you registered a change in your plant.
- Represent those changes on the following
timeline.
- Use the boxes to draw the change you saw
according to your calendar and write what happened on that day.
- Connect each box with
the day to which each change of your plant corresponds.
a. The Answer Key
(in color)
Examples of
the calendar and timeline registers are given here:
Own design
b. The purpose of
the activity making at least 3 connections with the base Reading (Ch.11
Brewer)
· These activities provide children the opportunity
to explore and make relations of numbers to one another in both the calendar
and timeline.
· These activities help children associate some
geometrical symbols with the parts of a plant after they were explained in the
problem solving activity: Let’s form a plant!. Therefore, the construction of
mental relationships will be easier.
· These activities support children’s ability to
recognize the difference between numbers of items in small sets, in this case
the calendar and the timeline. Since they will learn that the number of days in
which each change of the plant took place varies.
· These activities allow children to illustrate and
communicate their personal understanding of the parts of the plant and the
growth they had.
· Both the calendar and the timeline are tools in
which children’s knowledge can be reserved, remembered and discussed.
References:
Swinson, T. (2019). MathGenie.com. Puzzle
Power: How Puzzles Help Your Child's Development.
https://www.mathgenie.com/blog/puzzle-power-how-puzzles-help-your-childs-development#:~:text=Puzzles%20develop%20your%20child's%20problem,gross%20and%20fine%20motor%20skills.
Time Management Tools. (2020). Floral November
2020 Calendar Printable. https://www.axnent.com/november-2020-calendar-cute/
The information of the four geometrical
figures was based on the following web sites:
Trapezoid: https://www.mathsisfun.com/geometry/trapezoid.html
Pentagon: https://www.mathsisfun.com/geometry/pentagon.html
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