Christy, over at Superheroes and Princesses, reminded us, that this is National Chocolate Month, by making chocolate scented, play dough, the other day. That reminded me, I've been meaning to make homemade "Tootsie Rolls", again.It's been quite a while since we've made them, and I don't know why, because they are so quick, and easy to make, and such a fun treat (click here, to go back to the recipe, and instructions).
I rolled out most of the play dough like dough, into ropes, in plastic wrap, to be chilled, and then cut into the traditional Tootsie Roll-like shapes.
But first, I used a little of the dough to hand mold a few different, three dimensional shapes...
...to go along with Cindy Neuschwander's Sir Cumference and the Sword in the Cone.
In the story, Radius, must help his friend Vertex, to solve the mystery of Euler's Law (that if you add the number of faces on a polyhedron to the number of it's points, and then subtract it's edges, the number will always be two), in order to win a contest put forward by the King to name his successor.
The children counted the faces, sides, and vertices of their candies, before they ate them.
And, then as a follow up activity to the story, they folded two dimensional shapes into polyhedrons, too.
Some were printed from here, on the PBS Kids' site, to go along with the Cyberchase episode "Eureeka", which we viewed, here, earlier in the day.
And, some were printed from around the Internet from here, here, and here...
...to add a Valentine's touch to our lesson.
Because, there's a reason this is National Chocolate Month.
For more math activities, Valentine's themed, or otherwise, check out the Math Monday link-up, being hosted by Joyful Learner.
It's great to be a homeschooler.
7 comments:
I've never heard of this law - this series sounds better and better. We have a chocolate month every month in our house - we don't eat any other sweet treats :)
I remember making Tootsie Rolls for my older two kids when we first took milk and wheat out of their diet. We made it with potato-based imiatation milk powder and dairy-free margarine and it worked fine. I cut them in Tootsie Roll sized pieces and individually wrapping them in homemade wrappers. It took forever, but they loved them. I love the way you did your lesson with them and the little boxes are adorable. I love the way you are weaving in all different sources such as Cyberchase with the books.
How cool! I'll have to make tootsie rolls soon! I have never even thought about making them.
C loves Cyberchase. We are lucky that it is still on every day in our area. I have to make a point to check out the online activities to go along with it.
I love everything you have done with this series.
Wow. Your dedication to learning is showed by the unwrapping of those rolls. And your sacrifice to learning - with your study. I take note - and my I live up up to being able to find fine and wonderful ways to incorporate chocolate into our learning. . . .(Bowing).
This looks like so much fun. As I said before Selena loved Cyberchase when it was aired here in our area. I must note some this book, and see if Cyberchase has any DVD series. I know there was a lot of it she didn't understand, but she sure increased her math vocabulary.
Very cool activity! We love the Sir Cumference books! And having some yummy treats makes them even better!
Leah, I ordered these books from the library and this once came in first. I truly enjoyed reading this one to Roland (the other boys read it on their own). Now I'm going to print out some of the shapes. Thanks for bring these books to my attention!
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