Fall Saturday SAVY, Week 3, Encounters with Measurement (1st-2nd)
Our last Saturday of Encounters with Measurement was engaging and challenging! We started out the day with a “Feelings Check-in”, where many students shared that they were happy or excited about the day, and some reflected that they were also a little sad that it was our last session together. As the instructor and classroom assistant, we could relate to these sentiments. We are so grateful that you shared your children with us the last few weeks and have thoroughly enjoyed facilitating learning opportunities that allowed us to witness their creativity, productive struggles, and aha moments. It has been such a pleasure working with these talented young learners!
This week, our focus was on measuring capacity. Students made meaningful connections during a discussion of the concept of capacity. Through deductive reasoning and an understanding that area is measured in square units, they discovered that cubic units refer to the volume a container (such as a box) holds. In discussing liquid volume, students made predictions about how much a container could hold based on the shape and size of the container. Students experimented with different types of containers and made predictions as to whether the volume of one container was greater than, less than, or equal to another container. After some hands-on liquid conservation explorations, students learned about measurements of liquid in milliliters, liters, ounces, cups, pints, quarts, and gallons.
In the afternoon, we continued liquid volume measurement activities that followed the storyline, “In Search of the Yeti”. Students learned that the Yeti loves lemonade and that his drinking cup had to be a pail that held at least one and a half gallons. To further develop a conceptual understanding of liquid volume measurements and conversions, students constructed a “Capacity Yeti”, which was made up of visual representations of liquid volume measurements. The body was a gallon, arms and legs were quarts and pints, and hands and feet were cups. This visual representation was used to solve several conversion problems to find the most economical way to make “Yeti Lemonade”. Students discovered that there was a myriad of ways to make exactly 72 cups of lemonade. Since our time together was short, we only used a fraction of the resources in the “In Search of the Yeti – Measuring Up, Down and All-Around Student Mathematician’s Journal”. The books were sent home so that you may use them as extension activities from our sessions.
Wishing you and your families all the best as the winter holiday season approaches. If opportunities arise, encourage your young mathematician to assist with cooking holiday meals to provide some hands-on measurement conversion practice!
Ms. Davidson (Instructor) & Ms. Masoomi (Classroom Assistant)