The Math Department of BRFLS became very active recently and teachers planed a variety of teaching activities, the first of which is “being good at playing tangram”. The purpose of this contest is to deepen students’ understanding of the trangram. Teachers hoped they could make some break through because the first graders already learned it last semester.
Break through1: Speed
First, we needed students to have a very quick reaction speed when finding the shapes the teachers called out, such as, triangle, parallelogram, or square. This simple interaction gave students a very good warm-up.
Second, we wanted to see that students had improved quickly. After a semester’s study, students learned so many important rules and they were so glad to offer help to others. They also understood the importance of thinking and analysis and they are willing to try different questions. We are proud to see our students had improved.
Break through2: Passion
Students could not finish these tasks one after another without passion, and they were thankful towards each other after they helped their teammates do a perfect job.
Tangram has been popular since the Tang Dynasty of China, because seven simple pieces can make more than a thousand shapes and they are so vivid! Also it is a great tool to practice students’teamwork ability, their creative thinking and spatial imagination ability. Indeed it is an intelligence toy.
Students still wanted to play more and they were looking forward to next year’s contest.
