Area of shapes made from rectangles

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Minesatea
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Joined: Sat Oct 31, 2009 12:08 am

Area of shapes made from rectangles

Post by Minesatea »

Can anyone tell me what year / level you would expect average children to calculate the area of compound shapes made from more than 1 rectangle?
DS 's work seems inappropriately difficult.
yoyo123
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Joined: Mon Jun 18, 2007 3:32 pm
Location: East Kent

Re: Area of shapes made from rectangles

Post by yoyo123 »

I would expect year 5 & 6 to be doing this. What is the problem?
Tinkers
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Location: Reading

Re: Area of shapes made from rectangles

Post by Tinkers »

My DD was doing this in years 5/6.
Minesatea
Posts: 1234
Joined: Sat Oct 31, 2009 12:08 am

Re: Area of shapes made from rectangles

Post by Minesatea »

He is year 4 (last reported level 3c). Not sure of problem exactly, just a comment in his planner saying that he struggled with this, this week!
I will make up a few problems and try with him, but compared to his current targets ( green wall) it seemed hard.
yoyo123
Posts: 8099
Joined: Mon Jun 18, 2007 3:32 pm
Location: East Kent

Re: Area of shapes made from rectangles

Post by yoyo123 »

I found this quite useful with children who are struggling

http://www.bgfl.org/bgfl/custom/resourc ... index.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
southbucks3
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Re: Area of shapes made from rectangles

Post by southbucks3 »

Minesatea wrote:He is year 4 (last reported level 3c). Not sure of problem exactly, just a comment in his planner saying that he struggled with this, this week!
I will make up a few problems and try with him, but compared to his current targets ( green wall) it seemed hard.
Can I just say that I am v v v impressed that his journal had an update such as this...well done that teacher! I would expect yr4 to be able to work out very simple L shapes, if the dotted lines, and all dimensions were added for them, but not assume they could suss out the dimensions by themselves for a while.
mystery
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Joined: Tue Jul 21, 2009 10:56 pm

Re: Area of shapes made from rectangles

Post by mystery »

Yes, I am impressed with the feedback too. Maybe you could start to get him to break down complex shapes into rectangles and fill in missing measurements. Or do you find that school goes on in the following week to do work to surmount the difficulties?
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