Activity Reflection - Body Measurement, Outdoors and In

 I completed the activity this week (on calibrating body measurements) with one of my own boys and it reminded me of a body measurement activity that I did with my class last year. (Since I have moved out of the classroom and with Covid restrictions, I don't have the same kind of access to students as I did in the past.)

With my grade one students, we began a measurement activity by discussing height and different words we use when we are measuring. I showed students a photo of an old doorframe from my house (we saved it when we renovated our house) where we had kept track of my boys height each year. 

Doorframe Measurement

With the help of my EA, we measured the height of each student with string, cut the string and labeled it with the students name. I gave the students a 'Field Journal' which we set up prior to heading outside with categories like "shorter than me, longer than me and the same as me." We headed to the forest by our classroom and student were directed to use their string to measure whatever they chose in the forest and make notes in their journal. In the photos you can see students happily measuring and recording.

When we returned to the classroom, we debriefed our measurements and shared our finding. We discussed the benefits and drawbacks of measuring in this way, and we used the language of measuring in our conversations. We furthered the activity by lining up in our classroom - shortest to tallest and then we took the strings from each person - in height order - and made a graph on the floor with the strings.

This was the first lesson of several on measuring using non-standard units (in this case our height). Students were involved in the lesson and the embodiment of the lesson furthered their understanding, their connection to the learning and their enjoyment.

Later on in the year, we used our knowledge of measuring in the practical application of measuring the growth of potato plants we were growing,. This time we used rulers and then metre sticks to measure. The young students were able to use standard measures of instruments because they had built up their knowledge of measurement, starting with using their own bodies. 

These activities demonstrated, as stated in this week's introduction "mathematics coming from and going back to our bodily experiences of the world." (When we were done growing the potatoes, we counted how many we had grown from the seed potatoes and then we ate the potatoes - which helps our bodies grow! A full circle experience, so to speak.) The mathematics were meaningful to students because it was connected to their lives. We needed the symbols of mathematics - for recording and keeping track of growth and comparisons but we connected these symbols with our real world experiences and who we are - a far cry from the Platonic prejudice, from the ideas of mathematics as being solely mental and other-worldly. As the title of Antonsen's  Ted Talk, "Math is the hidden secret to understanding the world," I believe these measuring experiences helped my young students to see not only the world but the mathematics with in it from different perspectives, with different mediums, and hopefully in a way that developed their understanding, empathy and care of the world.