Clip 1/11: Area and Perimeter Pre-Lesson

Overview

In a conversation with a colleague, Robin Everage anticipates how her 3rd-grade students will engage with an exploration lesson focused on area and perimeter. She expects that her students will use various strategies — multiplication, use of blocks, drawings, conversations — and that they may bring prior conceptions about area and perimeter into the lesson.

Teacher Commentary

I was hoping for some really good conversation. Getting them to use some of their math vocabulary words correctly, instead of just saying "It's bigger" or "It's smaller." But a little bit more - making sure they're using area, perimeter, square units, just inches. Also with this lesson, I wanted to see them manipulate the actual square tile pieces, to build their arrays to figure out their areas, and for them to be able to come up with the correct multiplication problem for area, along with seeing what they could do with perimeter. Would they come up with the correct equation for that? Could they see the relationship between the two? Is there anything different they're seeing about it?