My son came home with this project in the third grade and I thought it was brilliant! But then, I was reminded of his third grade teacher, Mrs. Durbin, and it made sense. She understands how to teach mathematics effectively and is always doing fun, hands-on activities and projects with her students.

For this project, Mrs. Durbin was working with her students on the concept of area. Students created a design on inch graph paper and then indicated the total area.

As you can see in Ryan’s design, there are several squares that he needed to cut in half. This is a good opportunity to sneak in some fraction work: 1/2 + 1/2 = 1.

Depending on the design, it would be easy to tie in perimeter. The key, though, would be to avoid those diagonal cuts since these kiddos are not quite ready for the Pythagorean theorem.

CCSS: 3.G.2; 3.MD.5; 3.MD.6; (3.MD.8)