3-D Skeleton Build
Today, the students learned about and constructed skeletons of 3-D figures. A skeleton in geometric terms is a 3-D shape that has only edges and vertices. The students were given wooden 3-D figures to use as examples and had to create two skeletons out of Plasticine and toothpicks, though some students had enough time to make up to four. For the longer edges, such as the ones in a rectangular-based prism, I provided the students with thin Popsicle sticks to avoid adding a Plasticine connection which could be confused as a vertex or extra edge.
To start the students off, I did an example with the class before they began to help them to understand how to create these skeletons, and what the parts of the skeleton tell us about the figure once complete (i.e. edges, faces, vertices). Once the students made their skeletons, I had a small booklet prepared for them where they had to use the two skeletons they made to fill in blanks about how many vertices edges and vertices it has, as well as name the figure and draw a picture of it. Here is the booklet I made:
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Here are some shots of the students skeletons:
Here is the lesson plan I prepared for this activity:
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