Day 158 - Day 166 Vacation Projects

6th Grade Math Standards: 6.NS.2 Fluently add, subtract, multiply, and divide multi-digit decimals using the standard algorithm for each operation.

6.G.4 Represent three-dimensional figures using nets made up of rectangles and triangles, and use the nets to find the surface areas of these figures. Apply these techniques in the context of solving real-world and mathematical problems.

6.RP.1 Understand the concept of a ratio and use ratio language to describe a ratio relationship between two quantities. For example, “The ratio of wings to beaks in the bird house at the zoo was 2:1, because for every 2 wings there was 1 beak.” “For every vote candidate A received, candidate C received nearly three votes.”

Standard for Math Practice 5: Use appropriate tools strategically

6.W.3 Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, relevant descriptive details, and well-structured event sequences.

Question from the Project: Why is it the flight to Dublin so much longer than the flight back to Boston?

How do we determine how many miles the hotel is from our activities?

The Learning Objective: Write a check; balance a budget; subtract a decimal from a whole number; calculate miles per gallon and cost of gasoline; find a flight, hotel, and rental car using web based resources; write a story about what your vacation was like or what it will be like; present your story with Google slides, a brochure, a poster, a skit, a rap song, a video, or another means that you prefer; calculate the surface area and volume of your suitcase

Assessment:

Flight, Hotel, Rental Car, Gas Mileage
Check Ledger
Writing Checks
Suitcase
Proportions to breakdown budget

Agenda:

1. Pick a partner
2. Pick a city
3. Pick a flight (start doing the math on the checkbook ledger to ensure a balanced budget)
4. Pick a rental car
5. Pick a hotel
6. Pick out three activities
7. Find how far the activities are from the hotel
8. Write checks for all expenses
9. Find the net, dimensions, volume and surface area of the suitcase
10. Determine what percent of the budget was spent on all items
11. Make a graphic organizer that tells a story about the project
12. Write the story based on the graphic organizer. Here is one story a student wrote about their trip to Myrtle Beach. As you can tell, students sent these stories via Google Docs. 
13. Students presented their vacations to the class 

Glass Half-Full: We did a 3-2-1 summary in the journals after the presentations were completed. The three things they wrote about were things that they never knew about before doing the project. The two was they wish they had tried in their city or things they wished they tried in their presentation. The one was one math skill that is essential to planning a vacation. It seems like all the kids got something out of this based on what they shared and wrote. It also was apparent that engagement was higher during this project than it would be for the typical class. That's not something I find surprising given the autonomy that this project gives and the degree to which students can rely upon their creativity to get excited about the project.

Regrets: This is a massive mess to grade. I tried to give mini deadlines, but my students have trouble self-starting and cannot gain focus regardless of what I do were unable to follow through on these. As a result, most of my energy was geared toward these students throughout the project. Students knew what was expected of them day after day, so for students that were capable of self-regulating the mini deadlines were helpful.

The presentations were similar to the clothes they wear. Once they see someone doing something one way, they all tend to do it that way. I saw way more Google Slideshows than I ever wanted. Most of them just copied and pasted their stories to the slides. I had told them ahead of time, that the slide shows should have no more than three bullet points, but about half of the slide shows were paragraphs anyway. I think this is a hurdle for this age group (I'm not entirely sure because we haven't used Google Slideshows and creative writing alone all year - never mind using both in the same project). Presentations like the video above were few and far between, but I got a few of them and will hold onto those samples to ensure future classes know what creativity could look like for the bold students.

Link of the Day: Supposedly we can create our own visual patterns at Dudamath. Good one to explore over the summer.