Explore the connection between math and origami! Use classic origami
bases to create birds, fish, reptiles, and other animals. Construct
an expanding pinwheel and build intricate origami polyhedra. Try
your hand at inventing your own origami designs. Learn how math has
revolutionized origami by extending the creative reach of folders.
This week we will be leaning how math affects us every moment of
life by playing math games and making crafts. Math will be geared to
each age level so even the youngest can participate. We will have
swimming, archery and play games!
Camp is a great place for Girl Scouts to have fun with
math! In this session, we will play an animal population game, a
candy sharing game, and a counting strategy game. We will figure out
when it is possible to hike each trail in a camp exactly once.
Finally, we will estimate the height of a tree, and calculate how
much carbon dioxide the tree removes from the air.
In this hour-long workshop, we will try out several hands-on
activities that teach and reinforce basic fraction concepts. We will
incorporate many of the manipulatives in the Math Lab.
Try your hand at drawing ``sona'' --- traditional designs invented by the
Chokwe people, who live in central Africa. Determine which patterns can
be completed without lifting your pencil.
In this two-hour workshop, we will use the freeware program Fractint
to explore intricate and colorful designs created by repeating a
simple rule over and over again. This activity can reinforce and
motivate several important math concepts depending on the grade
level of the students. Some of these concepts are: number sense
relating to decimals and place value; computing with decimals and/or
negative numbers; pre-algebra and algebra skills relating to
variables, functions, and graphing. Students usually find fractals
fascinating and there are many ways they can continue to explore
them independently.
Join us as we trot, hop, gallop, and pace our way to an
understanding of how animals move. Use patterns and symmetry to
analyze a variety of primary and secondary animal gaits.
Make a cipher wheel to create and decode secret messages. Use the
power of statistics to crack encrypted messages even when you do not
know what cipher wheel setting was used.
Math Studio meets twice a week for three hours each session. Stop by
as often as you like to explore the geometry of polygons and
polyhedra. Learn to construct polyhedra by folding paper and by
snapping plastic Polydrons together. Lay the foundations by learning
to measure angles and by determining how many degrees are in any
triangle. Discover efficient methods for counting the number of
vertices, edges, and faces in each polyhedron. Build families of
shapes that have similar properties and discover formulas for the
face vectors of each family. Discover the Platonic solids
and prove that there are only five.
When is it possible to cross each bridge in a river-walk exactly
once? We will retrace Leonhard Euler's footsteps as we explore this
problem for river-walks in several cities.
Find out how mathematical biologists tackle questions about how our
bodies work. Build a simple model of an amino acid chain and decide
what folded configurations require the least amount of energy.
You can cut out any shape made from straight lines with just one
snip if you fold the paper in the right way first. We will figure
out how the theorem works for some simple shapes.
Our community has an opportunity to increase enthusiasm for
mathematics and science among people of all ages. Offering informal
math activities such as "Exploring the One-Cut Theorem" is one way
to expose people to fun mathematical ideas that are unlike topics
they see in school.
5th and 6th graders in Caryn Ellison's class determine how many
degrees there are in each angle of a regular n-gon. They use this
knowledge to fold a magic pinwheel that expands and contracts.
