4/9/2020 Exploring Triangle Area With Geoboards • Teacher Guide

Exploring Triangle Area With

CLASS CODE

Geoboards
30-45 minutes Practice
In this activity, students will use Desmos-powered geoboards to explore triangles and
their areas.

Digital geoboard inspired by Paul Jorgens (@pejorgens).

Dutch translation courtesy of Ari Fijan:

https://teacher.desmos.com/activitybuilder/custom/5bcf94d35ff9de5671c81525

Activity Checklist

Complete the activity using student preview.

Identify your learning targets for the activity.

Determine the screens where you’ll bring the class together using Teacher Pacing and Pause Class.
What will you discuss on those screens?

Anticipate screens where students will struggle, then plan your response.

Plan a challenge for students who finish the activity quickly and successfully.

Make yourself available during the activity to students for individual help and questions when
appropriate.

Write out your summary of the activity's main ideas. How will you pull student work into that summary?
Which parts of the activity can you skip to ensure that summary receives sufficient time?

My Learning Targets:

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4/9/2020 Exploring Triangle Area With Geoboards • Teacher Guide

Activity Screens: Teacher Pacing and Pause Class

Use this page to plan your use of Teacher Pacing and Pause Class. Teacher Pacing lets you restrict
students to a single screen or a range of screens. Pause Class keeps students from interacting with
whatever screens they are currently viewing. Use these two tools to create conversations in your classroom.
Consider these questions as you plan:

Which screen(s) should everyone work on at the same time? Why?

Which screen(s) do you want to keep students from seeing until you're ready for the class to see them
together? (Perhaps because they reveal answers or require a whole class conversation for
introduction.)

Are there any points in the lesson where you will want to make sure students aren’t playing with the
screens while you discuss something as a class?

11 Find
Find the
the Area
Area #1
#1 22 Find
Find the
the Area
Area #2
#2 33 Create
Create aa Triangle
Triangle 44 Class
Class Gallery
Gallery
Find the area Find the area Create a
of the of the triangle with
 triangle.
 triangle. area 3 square
units.
 
Try to create

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4/9/2020 Exploring Triangle Area With Geoboards • Teacher Guide

11 Find
Find the
the Area
Area #1
#1 Find the area of the triangle.
Find the area of
the triangle. Use the sketch tool if that helps to find your answer.

 U h k h Teacher Moves

Highlight unique answers and strategies for the class. Ask students to
justify their responses and critique each others' reasoning.

Sample Responses

• The area is 4 square units. I noticed that the entire grid has an area of
16 square units, and it would take four copies of this triangle to cover
the grid.
• The area of a 2-by-4 rectangle is 8 square units. This triangle is half
the size of a 2-by-4 rectangle, so its area is 4 square units.

My Notes:

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4/9/2020 Exploring Triangle Area With Geoboards • Teacher Guide

22 Find
Find the
the Area
Area #2
#2 Find the area of the triangle.
Find the area of
the triangle. Use the sketch tool if that helps to find your answer.

 U h k h Teacher Moves

Highlight unique answers and strategies for the class. Ask students to
justify their responses and critique each others' reasoning.

Sample Responses

I enclosed the triangle in a 3-by-4 rectangle and subtracted the areas of

the three "missing" triangles (bottom left, top left, and top right) that
surround our triangle. So our triangle has an area of
12 − 4 − 1.5 − 1.5 = 5 square units.

My Notes:

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4/9/2020 Exploring Triangle Area With Geoboards • Teacher Guide

33 Create
Create aa Triangle
Triangle Create a triangle with area 3 square units.
Create a
triangle with Try to create a triangle none of your classmates will.
area 3 square
units. Teacher Moves
Try to create a
triangle none of Highlight several unique triangles for the class. Ask students what they
notice and what they wonder based on the examples you share. Are
there patterns that emerge? Unique approaches that some students
hadn't considered?

Investing 2-3 minutes of class time to discuss the results here on Screen
3 will serve students well as they begin the Challenge Creator on Screen
4.

My Notes:

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4/9/2020 Exploring Triangle Area With Geoboards • Teacher Guide

44 Class
Class Gallery
Gallery Teacher Moves

Here students will create their OWN challenges and solve challenges
from their classmates. We recommend students complete the rest of the
activity before creating their challenge. We anticipate this Challenge
Creator will add 30 minutes to the duration of the activity.

Encourage students to complete each other's challenges but also to

take some time to review responses to their own. Use the teacher
dashboard to look for unique challenges and unique solutions that may
expand your students' understanding of the mathematics. Highlight
those for students and also ask them what they learned from the
experience.

We intend for this to be a social and creative experience for students.

We encourage you to emphasize those virtues whenever you see them
in your class.

My Notes:

Summary Notes:

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