Maths Day at BSB
On 2 March, BSB held its first whole school Maths Day spectacular.
Thursday, March 2, 2017
Every phase of the school was involved in a day jam-packed with fun activities to challenge their calculation skills, decoding skills, pattern recognition, spatial awareness and problem solving.
In EYFS children were making pairs in the sock-pairing activity. They followed patterns to make shapes and pictures with multilink cubes and wooden shapes, and used blocks and giant Lego to see who could build the tallest towers. They used visual reasoning to match shapes on clothes pegs, used their hands to measure furniture in the school and used calculation skills to find the answers on balloons before they popped on the hot floor.
KS1 and KS2
In KS1 and 2 children practised their teamwork by working in their houses and competed in the Spaghetti Tower Challenge. Each house was given one packet of marshmallows and half a pack of spaghetti and their task was to build the tallest tower. There were many different strategies being employed and many attempts were made – some more successful than others.
It was wonderful to see the children demonstrating the ability to change, adapt and improve their original ideas. Unfortunately there could only be one winner and in KS2 this was the Vikings whose tower measured an impressive 44cm. (An honourable mention goes to the Saxons whose tower was its closest rival but unfortunately fell before measuring could take place.)
Teams also had to work systematically to figure out the way out of the “No-left-turn” maze. They used their visualising and mathematical reasoning and route inspection skills in a variety of approaches, including working individually and pooling their ideas to taking turns and watching, improving every time and then follow the leader. In the end it was a group effort with Mr Fagan leading the teams out of the maze using the guidance of the bystanders!
In the afternoon there was a fast passed balloon game where children had to find the answers to their calculations which were floating around outside on balloons and then create questions for other teams to answer. This was followed by code breaking activities with invisible ink for KS1 and a Murder Mystery to solve for KS2.
All in all it was a busy jam-packed day full of mathematical activities where the children got to put their maths skills to good use - whatever their level!
In EYFS children were making pairs in the sock-pairing activity. They followed patterns to make shapes and pictures with multilink cubes and wooden shapes, and used blocks and giant Lego to see who could build the tallest towers. They used visual reasoning to match shapes on clothes pegs, used their hands to measure furniture in the school and used calculation skills to find the answers on balloons before they popped on the hot floor.
KS1 and KS2
In KS1 and 2 children practised their teamwork by working in their houses and competed in the Spaghetti Tower Challenge. Each house was given one packet of marshmallows and half a pack of spaghetti and their task was to build the tallest tower. There were many different strategies being employed and many attempts were made – some more successful than others.
It was wonderful to see the children demonstrating the ability to change, adapt and improve their original ideas. Unfortunately there could only be one winner and in KS2 this was the Vikings whose tower measured an impressive 44cm. (An honourable mention goes to the Saxons whose tower was its closest rival but unfortunately fell before measuring could take place.)
Teams also had to work systematically to figure out the way out of the “No-left-turn” maze. They used their visualising and mathematical reasoning and route inspection skills in a variety of approaches, including working individually and pooling their ideas to taking turns and watching, improving every time and then follow the leader. In the end it was a group effort with Mr Fagan leading the teams out of the maze using the guidance of the bystanders!
In the afternoon there was a fast passed balloon game where children had to find the answers to their calculations which were floating around outside on balloons and then create questions for other teams to answer. This was followed by code breaking activities with invisible ink for KS1 and a Murder Mystery to solve for KS2.
All in all it was a busy jam-packed day full of mathematical activities where the children got to put their maths skills to good use - whatever their level!
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