Interactive Geometry: 3rd Graders Dive into Triangles

Third-grade students explore various types of triangles through hands-on activities, as well as the use of iPads. The series of lessons includes students building triangles themselves, organizing the information they discover into Numbers, and ultimately bringing the triangles to life through animation!

Here is a brief outline of these lessons:

First, students partake in a lesson where they use the ‘Box of Geometry Sticks’ (a Montessori manipulative) to create a variety of triangles. Alongside the teacher, students create seven different triangles and label them with the correct name. Once completed, it might look something like this:

After students build and classify the triangles, they work on summarizing the information in Numbers on iPad. In small groups, the teacher leads a discussion on how this could be organized and what the different titles for the columns and rows are. The charts typically look something similar to one of these two samples:

There are many ways to scaffold students' learning and support them during this part of the lesson. To help students identify the triangles, they can be given tools such as a ruler to check the lengths of the sides and/ or a protractor to measure the angles. Additionally, rather than selecting a triangle from a pile, the triangles could be laid out in a chart-like fashion, similar to the one they created on Numbers. Then, students could select one at a time, and the heading would tell the student the exact name of that triangle.

Finally, students can place all of their triangle animations from ChatterPix into BookCreator. It can then be added to their virtual classroom library, shared as a video for others to watch (in other classrooms, too!), and even shared with their families.

Based on student ability, time, and resources, you might choose for each student to simply complete one ‘talking triangle’, and then make a class book together!

I’ve also done a very similar lesson where students learn about different three-dimensional geometric shapes! 

Happy Learning!