Brick Playbook: Parent Edition
Decoding Area
Use various methods to find the area of irregular shape objects.
Objective:
Child will be able to find the area of an irregular shape using various methods (counting, breaking design into colors).
Essential Question(s):
What strategies can we use to find the area of an irregular shape?
Special Materials:
Paper and pencil for recording data
Bricks Required:
16×16 plates, various bricks for “drawing” an image
Project Structure
Engage/Explore:
- Give child a 16×16 plate and additional bricks of various colors and sizes. Ask child to make a two-dimensional design using the bricks, which can be abstract or representational. You may wish to limit child to choosing three or four colors
Explain/Explore:
- Discuss the concept of area, talking about counting studs, or using the arrays found in rectangles. Demonstrate this using your own creation.
- Child can find area in various ways, and should keep track of their data:
- Area of the whole image
- Area of the unused part of the 16×16 plate
- Area of each color they used
- Encourage child to look for patterns in their creation. Do they tend to use the same brick size a few times? What colors do they use? etc.