Delmentria McDaniel

I am a student at the University of Southern Mississippi located in Hattiesburg and I am submitting this form on behalf of Mrs. McDowell MAT 210 class. We normally have the students come to our school and do the math trail but due to Hurricane Katrina we went to a local school named Grace Christian Elementary School. This project was a great way for the students to see how things that we use on a daily basis can be also use to create a math problem. Here are some of the math problems that we came up with as well as some pictures of the sites that the problems originated from.

We made this problem with a basketball goal in mind. The students in schools today love to play this sport so it was interesting to see how they could answer a problem with a one their favorite sports involved in it. It was also a fun way for the learn how to use the common denominators to solve a math problem using their favorite sport.

Question 1. You as a group will be asked to shoot a basketball into a goal 12 times. Each person should shoot an equal number of times and the number of times the ball goes into the goal should be recorded.

1) Find the sum of the shots that went into the goal and the sum of the shots that were NOT made.

2) Determine what fraction if the shots went into the goal. Express your answer in simplest form.

3) Determine what fraction if the sots were NOT made. Express your answer in simplest form.

4)Find the sum of the fractions in parts 2 and 3.

Classification. Fourth Grade Level Identify numerical relationships with whole numbers, decimals, and fractions (P,D,M,G,N),

The strategy used to solve this problem was picking the number of people in a group; I choose a group of 3. Then I added up the number of times each person in the group made a shot over 12. I did the same for the total number of times that the shot were NOT made. And in the end to find out the sum of fractions I add the fractions and reduced them to the simplest from and not forget to use common denominators.

Answer: 1) Person A shot 7 times, Person B shot 5 times, and Person C shot 9 times. Add 7+5+9=21 for the shots made and 5+7+3=15 for shot NOT made

2) 7/12+5/12+9/12=21/12 =1 9/12 = 1 ¼

3) 5/12+7/12+3/12= 15/12 = 1 3/12 = 1 ¼

4) 1 ¼ +1 ¼ = 2 2/4 or 2 ½

All kids enjoy being able to swing during recess I know I did. I thought that solving this problem was a good way for them to see how they could use the swings in an effective manner and everyone would be able to use it the same number of times without fighting over it the way we use to when I was growing up.

Question 2. Count the swings. (There are5 swings.) If each student has one turn swinging and the turn lasts for 6 minutes, how many students will get to swing in 42 minutes? How many students will get to swing in 1-½ hours?

Classification: Grade Level Third Model, identify, and apply the four basic operations.

The strategy used was the total number of minutes 42 and divide it by the number of minutes each person had to swing 6 to get the number people that could swing in 42 minutes. To get the number people that could swing in 1 ½ hours which when converted from hours to minutes is 90 minutes and divide that by the total number of minutes 6. To find out the answer for 5 swings just take each answer and multiply by 5.

Answer. 42 divided by 6 equals 7. 7 students can swing in one swing in 42 minutes. 90 divided by 6 equals 15. 15 students can swing in one swing in 90 minutes or 1-½ hours.

To find out for 5 swings in 42 minutes, multiply 5 times 7 which equals 35. 35 people can swings in 5 swings in 42 minutes. And to find out for 5 swings in 1-½ hours, multiply 15 times 5 which equals 75. 75 people can swing in 5 swings in 1-½ hours or 90 minutes.

The last question that I wanted to submit was on the classroom windows. We all know students can sometimes get occupied with looking out the classroom windows instead of paying attention to their class work and this problem helped to put their mind at work to use their mathematical skills on something in their environment. And I was a great way to introduce fractions in a simple way.

Question 3. Each fourth grade classroom has two window units, and each window unit has eight window panes of equal size. Unfortunately in one window unit, two of the eight window panes were damaged by the winds of Hurricane Katrina. In ht second window unit, three of the eights were damaged by the winds of Hurricane Katrina. Each window is shown below.

a) Use a fraction to represent the DAMAGED panes of each of the windows. Then add these fractions.

b) Use a fraction to represent the UNDAMAGED panes of each of the windows. Then add fractions.

Classification: Grade Level Fourth Identify numerical relationships with whole numbers, decimals, and fractions. (P,D,M,G,N).

The strategy used was addition in parts A and B.

Answer. A) 2 the number DAMAGED over the total window panes which is 8 for the first window and 3 over 8 for the second window. I added 2/8 + 3/8 = 5/8.

b) 6 the number of UNDAMAGED windows panes over the total of window panes for the first window and for the second window would be 5 over 8. I added 6/8 + 5/8 = 11/8 =1 3/8 when reduced.