Building with Boxes: Part 1: Pi and Pythagoras's theorem.

  

 I love pinterest! I found this cool, lighted cardboard house sculpture and thought it would make a great Winter holiday project. Turns out we couldn't wait for the holidays so I decided to turn it into a math lesson.

This is what we did...

 Step 1) Measure the width and height of the first box. (Ours was 54cm x 20.5cm)

2) Divided the length by 3 and rule box into thirds. (18cm)

3) In the middle section my son decided on the door placement and used a circle (roll of tape in our case) to mark the top of the door. Then just for 'fun' he measured the radius, diameter and circumference. (D x Pi = 28.26cm.)

4) Turn circle archway and cut two castle or church shape doors.

 Somebody enjoyed himself....

Next came the stairway and Pythagoras's theorem.

 

Pythagoras said that if you have 2 known sides of a triangle you can work out the third.

This is what we did...

1) Width of 1/3 of box = 18cm 

18cm squared = 324cm

Height of box -1/3 = 13.6cm

13.6cm squared = 184.96

324 + 184.96 -= 508.96

Square root of 508.96 = 22.56cm

The length of the missing side if 22.56cm.

2) My son ruled a line 22.6 cm long to put the stairway on and using cut kebab sticks we secured it in place and cut some more windows.

Stay tuned for the rest of this multi-story building! This is a fun way to revise or teach math so we're going to make the most of it!

May your nest be blessed,

Lisa