Website review by Emily Pohlonski, Common Sense Education | Updated July 2012
Figure This!
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Figure This!

Real-world examples illustrate complex math concepts

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Grades
4–8
Subjects & Skills
Math, English Language Arts, Critical Thinking, Character & SEL
Price:  Free
Platforms:  Website
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5 images
Figure This! provides math challenges for families and classrooms.
Learning Challenges can be viewed online or printed out in color or black and white.
Learning Challenge 3 – “Popcorn” asks kids to decide which container will hold more popcorn.
Each learning challenge provides ways to get started, a complete solution, and opportunities to extend the activity.
When learning challenges are viewed directly from the website, families can access ways to get started and hints through the menu on the bottom.

Pros: Storytelling helps kids relate math to their lives.

Cons: It takes time find the right task, since challenges are not organized by level or Common Core Math Standards.

Bottom Line: Figure This! provides 76 math challenges to get kids using math in everyday situations.

How Can I Teach with This Tool?

Teachers can send the math challenges home throughout the school year, pass them out at parent night, or give presentations encouraging parents to use the website at home. The math challenges can be done in class, or the extensions can be used as class projects. Overall, it's an engaging way to teach math concepts, as Figure This! helps kids see that math is part of their everyday lives.

Additional materials are available to help you with instruction.

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Standards:

Engaging math problems in Figure This!, a website sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, teach kids how to project salary growth, estimate percentages, and graph information to analyze trends. It's not all grown-up concepts, though: They also can determine which baseball player has the higher batting average, how far a paper airplane can fly or how far you can drive on a tank of gas, and how distance and angles affect mirror reflections. They also learn how to estimate surface area and compare fractions. From algebra and geometry to statistics and probability, the site features more than 76 challenges.

Challenges are listed by topic and title, and kids can access them on the site or print them out as PDFs. Each challenge shows ways to get started and comes with a hint, the correct answer with an explanation, and extra questions and reading suggestions to extend learning. 

Kids who aren't crazy about math may be inspired to learn about, for example, integers, probability, and algebra. The challenges are much more interesting than cut-and-dried number problems. Each helps kids visualize how math works in the real world and involves a detailed example that kids can relate to, such as the probability of two people at the same school having the same initials. 

Adding age suggestions and aligning activities to the Common Core Math Standards would make the site even stronger.

Overall Rating
Engagement
Math story problems engage kids in problem-solving as well as rich discussions.
Pedagogy
Figure This! offers fun math-inquiry activities, but responsiveness is limited to a single hint for all problems.
Support
Each activity offers solutions and opportunities to extend learning. Resources are also available in Spanish.
Common Sense reviewer
Emily Pohlonski Classroom teacher
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Key Standards Supported

Expressions And Equations

  • 6.EE.7

    Solve real-world and mathematical problems by writing and solving equations of the form x + p = q and px = q for cases in which p, q and x are all nonnegative rational numbers.

  • 6.EE.9

    Use variables to represent two quantities in a real-world problem that change in relationship to one another; write an equation to express one quantity, thought of as the dependent variable, in terms of the other quantity, thought of as the independent variable. Analyze the relationship between the dependent and independent variables using graphs and tables, and relate these to the equation. For example, in a problem involving motion at constant speed, list and graph ordered pairs of distances and times, and write the equation d = 65t to represent the relationship between distance and time.

  • 7.EE.3

    Solve multi-step real-life and mathematical problems posed with positive and negative rational numbers in any form (whole numbers, fractions, and decimals), using tools strategically. Apply properties of operations to calculate with numbers in any form; convert between forms as appropriate; and assess the reasonableness of answers using mental computation and estimation strategies. For example: If a woman making $25 an hour gets a 10% raise, she will make an additional 1/10 of her salary an hour, or $2.50, for a new salary of $27.50. If you want to place a towel bar 9 3/4 inches long in the center of a door that is 27 1/2 inches wide, you will need to place the bar about 9 inches from each edge; this estimate can be used as a check on the exact computation.

  • 7.EE.4.b

    Solve word problems leading to inequalities of the form px + q > r or px + q < r, where p, q, and r are specific rational numbers. Graph the solution set of the inequality and interpret it in the context of the problem. For example: As a salesperson, you are paid $50 per week plus $3 per sale. This week you want your pay to be at least $100. Write an inequality for the number of sales you need to make, and describe the solutions.

  • 7.EE.1

    Apply properties of operations as strategies to add, subtract, factor, and expand linear expressions with rational coefficients.

  • 7.EE.2

    Understand that rewriting an expression in different forms in a problem context can shed light on the problem and how the quantities in it are related. For example, a + 0.05a = 1.05a means that “increase by 5%” is the same as “multiply by 1.05.”

  • 8.EE.8.c

    Solve real-world and mathematical problems leading to two linear equations in two variables. For example, given coordinates for two pairs of points, determine whether the line through the first pair of points intersects the line through the second pair.

Functions

  • 8.F.5

    Describe qualitatively the functional relationship between two quantities by analyzing a graph (e.g., where the function is increasing or decreasing, linear or nonlinear). Sketch a graph that exhibits the qualitative features of a function that has been described verbally.

Geometry

  • 6.G.4

    Represent three-dimensional figures using nets made up of rectangles and triangles, and use the nets to find the surface area of these figures. Apply these techniques in the context of solving real-world and mathematical problems.

  • 7.G.1

    Solve problems involving scale drawings of geometric figures, including computing actual lengths and areas from a scale drawing and reproducing a scale drawing at a different scale.

  • 7.G.4

    Know the formulas for the area and circumference of a circle and use them to solve problems; give an informal derivation of the relationship between the circumference and area of a circle.

  • 7.G.6

    Solve real-world and mathematical problems involving area, volume and surface area of two- and three-dimensional objects composed of triangles, quadrilaterals, polygons, cubes, and right prisms.

  • 8.G.9

    Know the formulas for the volumes of cones, cylinders, and spheres and use them to solve real-world and mathematical problems.

  • 8.G.1.a

    Lines are taken to lines, and line segments to line segments of the same length.

  • 8.G.2

    Understand that a two-dimensional figure is congruent to another if the second can be obtained from the first by a sequence of rotations, reflections, and translations; given two congruent figures, describe a sequence that exhibits the congruence between them.

  • 8.G.4

    Understand that a two-dimensional figure is similar to another if the second can be obtained from the first by a sequence of rotations, reflections, translations, and dilations; given two similar two- dimensional figures, describe a sequence that exhibits the similarity between them.

Ratios And Proportional Relationships

  • 6.RP.3.a

    Make tables of equivalent ratios relating quantities with whole- number measurements, find missing values in the tables, and plot the pairs of values on the coordinate plane. Use tables to compare ratios.

  • 7.RP.2.a

    Decide whether two quantities are in a proportional relationship, e.g., by testing for equivalent ratios in a table or graphing on a coordinate plane and observing whether the graph is a straight line through the origin.

Statistics And Probability

  • 7.SP.6

    Approximate the probability of a chance event by collecting data on the chance process that produces it and observing its long-run relative frequency, and predict the approximate relative frequency given the probability. For example, when rolling a number cube 600 times, predict that a 3 or 6 would be rolled roughly 200 times, but probably not exactly 200 times.

  • 7.SP.7

    Develop a probability model and use it to find probabilities of events. Compare probabilities from a model to observed frequencies; if the agreement is not good, explain possible sources of the discrepancy.

  • 7.SP.8.c

    Design and use a simulation to generate frequencies for compound events. For example, use random digits as a simulation tool to approximate the answer to the question: If 40% of donors have type A blood, what is the probability that it will take at least 4 donors to find one with type A blood?

  • 7.SP.2

    Use data from a random sample to draw inferences about a population with an unknown characteristic of interest. Generate multiple samples (or simulated samples) of the same size to gauge the variation in estimates or predictions. For example, estimate the mean word length in a book by randomly sampling words from the book; predict the winner of a school election based on randomly sampled survey data. Gauge how far off the estimate or prediction might be.

The Number System

  • 6.NS.1

    Interpret and compute quotients of fractions, and solve word problems involving division of fractions by fractions, e.g., by using visual fraction models and equations to represent the problem. For example, create a story context for (2/3) ÷ (3/4) and use a visual fraction model to show the quotient; use the relationship between multiplication and division to explain that (2/3) ÷ (3/4) = 8/9 because 3/4 of 8/9 is 2/3. (In general, (a/b) ÷ (c/d) = ad/bc.) How much chocolate will each person get if 3 people share 1/2 lb of chocolate equally? How many 3/4-cup servings are in 2/3 of a cup of yogurt? How wide is a rectangular strip of land with length 3/4 mi and area 1/2 square mi?

  • 7.NS.3

    Solve real-world and mathematical problems involving the four operations with rational numbers.

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Community Rating

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Featured review by
Gloria E. , Other
Other
Georgian Court University
Lakewood, United States
No interactivity but extremely good real-world scenarios to supplement you content.
Real-world scenarios are excellent when asking students to apply concepts learned. However, "Figure This: Math Challenges for Families" is text-based which means no interactivity, no sound, no multimedia (although PowerPoint presentation is included), and no feedback. As such, ELL students and low literacy students will need a great deal of support. A good teacher can make the scenarios interesting and even exciting, so using it as supplemental materials would work, especially since a large portion of t ...
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