Day 1: How Far?
Question: How far is it from the first tree to the last tree (ie. point A to point B)?
Rules: You can take a pencil, paper and clipboard outside with you. Nothing else.
Different groups were able to tell me the distance from one tree to the other using units like:
- Jose's feet
- Jasmines (not her feet, but her)
- Brandon's longest stride
Me: "Will that work?"
"Yeah. Because the spaces are the same."
"How can you be sure? "
"Because look at them..."
"Yeah, I want them to be the same too. That'd be really helpful, huh?"
Now they have dilemma: do they go and measure the distance between each tree or just measure the entire distance from the first to the last? (wait, that's the same thing...which makes it a doublemma)
Oh, you want my help? Lemme show you how Google Earth can help you out here.
Day 2: How high?
Question: Come up with two different methods for finding the height of the building.
Rules: Don't climb up there.
Some of the methods:
- Ask Chuck. (Turns out Chuck, our custodian, had a copy of the elevations.)
- Take a picture of Cameron next to the building and see how many Camerons to the top.
- All kinds of crazy uses of a meter stick.
- Count how many bricks in a foot and then count the total bricks. (3 bricks and spaces = 1 foot.)
- A well thought out plan makes jobs easier
- Sometimes we need to adjust our plans
- Assumptions need to be investigated
- We can use some tools in ways we've never imagined (eg. cell phone camera, Google Earth)
- Some sources aren't trustworthy