Subject Area Mathematics

Title of lesson

Learn to graph points on the coordinate plane with a fun online tutorial and game

Author and Institution

Sulan Dun, http://FunBasedLearning.com
16018 NE 44 Ct.
Redmond, WA, 98052
author@funbasedlearning.com

Objective(s):

This lesson will introduce the fourth to eight grade student to coordinates and teach them why they are useful and how to plot coordinates on on the coordinate plane.

Materials Needed:

http://funbasedlearning.com/algebra/graphing/points/default.htm - Easy version of Graph Mole for the tutorial and easy game to play

http://funbasedlearning.com/algebra/graphing/default.htm - Medium and Hard versions of Graph Mole for addition practice and fluency in graphing points

Strategy:

1. Have students go to http://funbasedlearning.com/algebra/graphing/points/default.htm and click the Introduction button. There, they learn why coordinates are useful and how they work in a fun interactive story and tutorial.

2. Upon completion of the tutorial, students play the Easy Version of Graph mole to identify which coordinate the mole is at before he can eat all the vegetables.

3. When students have mastered the easy version of Graph mole, they progress to the medium and hard versions of Graph Mole for additional practice and fluency in graphing points.

Performance Assessment:

The easiest way to asses this is to just ask them to show you the final screen for each version. Here is a scoring/assessment guide:

Easy version - maximum score is 5000 points if every question is answered perfectly. A score of 4000 or more means they have mastered this version.

Medium version - students should be able to complete the game and get to the final screen. Any score here is fine as long as they can get to the final screen -

they have a satisfactory mastery of the material. Maximum score is 6000 points.

Hard version - if a student can get to the final screen in the hard version, that's quite an achievement, it's an excellent master of the material. Maximum score is 10000 points.

Conclusion(s):

This is a fun way to teach coordinate point graphing and it's very motivating for students to learn as the mole and his story is funny and they can compete with one another informally as to who can get a higher score.