SDMS Grade 6 Lesson Five

SDMS 6 Lesson Five

The following is a sample of an integrated lesson plan with Lego® constructives and the existing SDMS 6th Grade Math Curriculum.

PROBABILITY:

OBJECTIVE: Students will be able to identify and calculate odds of drawing a black brick from a container.

KEY VOCABULARY: Probability, Ratio, Trials

MATERIALS: Paper, pencil, ruler, AOE Lab

DISCUSSION:

Lead a class discussion about probability. Probablity is the odds something will happen or that an event will occur. Usually, we think of probability as a ratio of the number of favorable results divided by the total number of trials.

Gather 50 LEGO® 2x2 bricks, making sure that 25 are white and 25 are black. Put them into a container that does not lend itself to peeking inside.

ACTIVITY 1: Require students randomly draw out a brick and record their results. After 10 trials ( returning the brick each time ), require students to guestimate the probability of drawing a black brick based on their experiments.

Hint:

In 10 trials 5 white bricks and 5 black bricks are chosen.

This makes the odds pretty even of drawing out a black or white brick every time.

ACTIVITY 2: Require students to calculate the odds of drawing a black brick using a ratio.

ACTIVITY 3: Repeat the experiment, except keep out each drawn brick. At the end of 10 trials, require students to calculate the probability of drawing a black brick on the 11th trial.

ACTIVITY 4: Challenge students to influence the probabilty. Have them concentrate on the "color black," stand on one foot or utter a formula ( such as: "Come out 2x2 black brick" ). Compare the ratio with previous trials. Did the actions alter the probability?

SDMS Grade 6 Math Curriculum