BMUFSD: First Graders Have St. Patrick's Day-Themed Math Activity

Press release from the Briarcliff Manor Union Free School District:

2023-03-21

In Jennifer Horowitz’s first grade class at Todd School, St. Patrick’s Day is not just about soda bread, leprechauns and shamrocks … it is also about math.

On St. Patrick’s Day, Ms. Horowitz found a unique way to incorporate the holiday into a math lesson.

As part of their measuring unit, students used unifix cubes, which are math manipulatives, to measure green classroom objects such as crayons, pipe cleaners and dominos.

Working in small groups, students first estimated how many unifix cubes they would need in order to measure each item and discussed it with each other. Next, they used the cubes, which connect to one another, to measure the objects.

“It is a fun way for the students to work together and practice expressing the length of an object using nonstandard units,” Ms. Horowitz said.

“The pencil was seven unifix cubes, so I think the pipe cleaner will be 20 cubes because it’s longer,” Violet said.

This press release was produced by the Briarcliff Manor Union Free School District. The views expressed here are the author’s own.