Year Five Inquiry Resources
Select a strand from the Australian Curriculum: Mathematics, below.
NUMBER AND ALGEBRA
Reaction Time: Who has the best reaction time?
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This inquiry presents a need for collecting data involving small decimal numbers.
Students consider factors that may affect a person’s reaction time and pose a question to investigate whether the factor has an influence. Collaboratively, students determine the kind of data they will need to collect and make further decisions about how they will organise their data (e.g. in stacked dot plots) to communicate their answer. Throughout this process, students will encounter the real problem of how to read, record and plot reaction times recorded as a decimal number of seconds or as whole numbers of milliseconds. This inquiry provides rich opportunities for students to experience all stages of a statistical investigation. The guided mathematical inquiry unit, Reaction Time: Who has the best reaction time?, and the description above, can be found at the reSolve: Maths by Inquiry website.
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Food for thought: Do Primary students eat nutritious breakfast cereals?
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In this unit, students explore the nutritional value of a variety of cereals and investigate whether the most popular cereals are actually nutritious.
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Fight for Flight: What is the best design for a loopy aeroplane?
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In this unit, students combine knowledge of the principles of flight with the technology process to determine the most effective design for a loopy aeroplane.
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Record Breaking: Are athletes getting better over time?
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In this unit, students will focus on sporting records and performance and consider factors that have had an impact on athletes' performance over time.
Links to Australian Curriculum: Mathematics:
Year 5: ACMMG108, ACMNA104, ACMNA105, ACMSP118, ACMSP119, ACMSP120 See our blog post Record breaking in every year level! for more information on how to align this inquiry with your own year level.
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MEASUREMENT AND GEOMETRY
Little Boxes: What is the most suitable way to package four small boxes?
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In the context of a request from a health foods manufacturer, students are challenged to develop the 'best' design for packaging four small snack boxes.
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Record Breaking: Are athletes getting better over time?
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In this unit, students will focus on sporting records and performance and consider factors that have had an impact on athletes' performance over time.
Links to Australian Curriculum: Mathematics:
Year 5: ACMMG108, ACMNA104, ACMNA105, ACMSP118, ACMSP119, ACMSP120 See our blog post Record breaking in every year level! for more information on how to align this inquiry with your own year level.
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STATISTICS AND PROBABILITY
Reaction Time: Who has the best reaction time?
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This inquiry presents a need for collecting data involving small decimal numbers.
Students consider factors that may affect a person’s reaction time and pose a question to investigate whether the factor has an influence. Collaboratively, students determine the kind of data they will need to collect and make further decisions about how they will organise their data (e.g. in stacked dot plots) to communicate their answer. Throughout this process, students will encounter the real problem of how to read, record and plot reaction times recorded as a decimal number of seconds or as whole numbers of milliseconds. This inquiry provides rich opportunities for students to experience all stages of a statistical investigation. The guided mathematical inquiry unit, Reaction Time: Who has the best reaction time?, and the description above, can be found at the reSolve: Maths by Inquiry website.
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Biased Bingo: What bingo card would give me the best chance of winning?
Fight for Flight: What is the best design for a loopy aeroplane?
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In this unit, students combine knowledge of the principles of flight with the technology process to determine the most effective design for a loopy aeroplane.
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You may also be interested in other inquiries from the Thinking through Mathematics series, Book 3 (Ages 10-13) |
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- Walking School Bus: What is the best walking school bus route in our school catchment area? In this unit students devise a walking school bus route and timetable that is appropriate for their school catchment area.
- Take or Make: How expensive is takeaway food? In this unit, students combine their familiarity with takeaway food menus to determine how expensive takeaway food actually is.
- My Space: What's the best way to arrange our classroom? In this unit, students design a classroom arrangement that best meets the needs of the class.
- Growing Up: How much do we grow in primary school? In this unit, students compare data sets to identify how much a typical student grows during their primary years of schooling.
