WEEK 4: M&Ms and Mermaids

This week presented us with a fantastic approach to integrating M&Ms into math. I really enjoyed this lesson. All students were asked to bring a packet of M&Ms to class. The task was to graph the different colours in our packets. We were given a sheet first to graph it.

(Left)





After this we were asked to enter our data into Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. A chart was created showing the different colours in our packets. (Below.) Everyone's numbers of the colours were different. This could be a good time to look at mode, mean, median, and range. For example, based on the chart below the mode is 6. The mean is 9. The median is 7. The range is 13. Just doing this could be a lesson in itself. Students could then group together, add their results, and figure out the new mode, mean, median and range. However I would want the students to represent this in some way on a graph or number line. It needs to be made tangible so that students will retain the information.





After we completed the chart we continued on with graphing the M&Ms. This was really exciting: I didn't realise how simple it was to create a graph. We were also shown how to Change the colours and backgrounds of the graphs. In the end, I was very pleased with what I was able to create. (Below)



This activity could be followed up by looking at the nutritional information: looking at kilojoules; fat content; or sugar content. This could be part of a health class. If you were looking at fat content, you could look at the suggested fat intake per day and look at how much a packet of M&Ms would contribute to that.



If any students have allergies, this can be done with another topic such as hair colour, height, ethnic background (if it is a diverse classroom), First letter of a name, etc. There are many possibilities.

The second part of this lesson we looked at a website called DustEchoes. This website is fantastic. I would very much like to use this website in my classroom. We had a look at the video animations on this website. Using the video, we cut and pasted scenes from it into inspiration to create a story map. (Left) The story map I created was of the video called Mermaid.

This would be a good activity to do with students. What is great about this website is that each video comes with a study guide. This study guide contains many different ideas for lessons.