What Do You Notice? Valentine's Venn

Skills

Primary students (K-2): counting, colors, shapes, sorting and classifying

Intermediate students (3-5): counting, sorting and classifying, logical thinking

Mathematical Background

It was the week before Valentine's Day and I was committed to using conversation hearts in my 'What Do You Notice?' poster. I thought a venn diagram would work nicely. A venn diagram illustrates the common attributes between sets. In our case, the first circle is the set of numbers greater than 5 and the second circle is the set of numbers less than 10. The intersection of the circles are the numbers that fit both sets - 6, 7, 8, and 9.

This was a pretty tough venn diagram to figure out so I decided to give a hint. The total number of letters on each heart determines where each conversation heart is placed. In order to get enough hearts for my circles, I had to make up some of my own phrases. For fun, I included a Challenge! question.

Younger students can count the different number of colored hearts or even the total number of hearts. And, of course, they may notice the two large circles.

Sample Student Responses

"Every heart has 4 but blue has 3."

"left circle > 5; right circle < 10. It would go in the center."

"4 pink hearts"

"There's more green and yellow than others."