Problem Solvers
18 May 2022
This week on Wednesday Miss Rogers taught us in the morning. We had a morning of maths but not our usual maths lessons. It was a morning of problem solving.
We began with a logic problem, we had 8 colour cards and a set of clues. In groups we had to work through the clues carefully to be able to put the colours in the correct order. This problem involved teamwork, knowledge of colours and logical thinking.
Next we had a problem which allowed us to get building. A city had very strict planning rules, any houses built must have 2 rooms on the base and have a room for each member of the family. The children had create as many different house designs as they could for a family of 7.
Other problems we did included money. These problems involved us unpicking the question to see what information we needed and what steps we would have to do to find solutions. We had to use our addition and subtraction skills. We had a question which had 27 possible answers and we had to work out which answers could be correct by ruling out the wrong ones given the information we had. Another problem involved going to a sweet shop and working out what combinations of sweets different children could buy with different amounts of money and using different criteria.
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The children really enjoyed our alien challenge using sticks and play dough to create ‘Zios and Zepts'. Zios had 3 legs and Zepts had 7. A new planet had been discovered and on the planet there were 52 legs. The children had to find different combinations of aliens which would have a total of 52 legs. There had to be at least 2 of each alien. This challenge involved trial and error and using multiplication facts as well as addition. The children preserved and tried lots of numbers before they found solutions.
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We finished the morning with the children in small groups playing a dice game. The game involved each person rolling 3 dice, with the three numbers they had they could use any combination of operations to make a number. They then ‘captured’ that number by colouring it on their group’s number grid. It was then the next person’s go. The winner was the person who ‘captured’ the most numbers.
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Have a lovely weekend!
Miss Rogers and Mrs Barker