Take a moment … What do you notice? What do you wonder?
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What could we do with this? Where could we go?
I saw this video today
It’s this video that made me think of creating the problem stated above. Did you notice in the original picture that the distances were the same? But the travel times were different? What was the speed of the plane? What was the speed of the wind?
Click to enlarge.
I then thought of these problems…
A super common problem we see in our Grade 10 Academic course here in Ontario. The first airplane problem and this motor boat problem have no real difference but opening up the problem by asking “What do you notice? What do you wonder?” allows us as a class to narrow down to the problem together. It allows us as a class to discuss why the flight times are different. The class feels like they had a hand in coming up with the math for the day.
See also Dan Meyer’s Boat in a River problem — it’s a beauty.
