Activity Overview
Students study the perimeter and area of a square, and explore the relationship between them and the length of the side of the square.
Before the Activity
Install the Cabri™: Jr. App on the students' graphing calculators using one of these two methods:
TI-Connect™, a TI Connectivity Cable, and the Unit-to-Unit Link Cable
TI-Navigator™ "send to class" feature
See the attached PDF file for detailed instructions for this activity
Print pages 69 - 70 from the attached PDF file for your class
During the Activity
Distribute the pages to the class.
Follow the Activity procedures:
Use the Regular Polygon feature on the calculator to construct a square
Measure and record the length of one side of the square
Measure the perimeter and area of the square
Alter the square until its side length is 1 cm and record the values of perimeter and area in a table
Record the side length, perimeter, and area of squares with side lengths of 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6cm
Observe that the perimeter of a square increases by 4 units as the length of the side increases by 1 unit
Compare the first six perfect square numbers to the numbers in the Area column
Observe that the area of a square is always a perfect square number
After the Activity
Review student results:
As a class, discuss questions that appeared to be more challenging
Re-teach concepts as necessary