Charmaine Pinheiro

Mathematics Education: Unit Plan

Introduction

Topic focus:
Measurement and Geometry Strand: Shape
Context descriptors:
Recognise and classify familiar two-dimensional shapes and three-dimensional objects using obvious
features (Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) 2012).

Age group:
Year 1

Socio-cultural diversity:
Hypothetically, the children that this unit plan is targeted and will predominantly comprise of students
whose first language is English. These children may also come from many diverse backgrounds from
around the world although the majority were probably born in Australia. This seems like a realistic
situation as Australia is a multicultural society and English is considered the first language. These
students will be from a metropolitan public school.
Special needs of individuals/Group as diverse learners:
With this specific class there appears to be no children in the class with an intellectual or physical
disability. However, the class should always be treated as a group of diverse learners and because of
this it is important to go through the content in a number of different ways. This will ensure students
of different learning styles can understand what is being taught, which is what has been attempted in
this unit plan. Making the lessons as interactive and hands on as possible is important as students
should feel motivated and excited to learn; the linking of multiple lessons will be done to achieve this.

Prior knowledge:
According to ACARA (2012) students should have learnt during their foundation year to be able to
sort, describe and name familiar two-dimensional shapes and three-dimensional objects in the
environment.

Charmaine Pinheiro
Presentation
Lesson 1
Lesson objectives:
-

ENGAGE and find out students prerequisite knowledge

The students will:

1. identify various shapes by name
2. learn how to recognise corners and sides on different shapes
3. be able to count the corners and sides of a shape to determine its name
Assessment:
Objective 1: Correctly be able to identify and name shapes by its number of corners and sides
Objective 2: Understand what properties of a square differentiate it from a rectangle or rhombus
Objective 3: Make sure they have learnt the appropriate shape skills in foundation. Students should
be able to Sort, describe and name familiar two-dimensional shapes and three-dimensional objects
in the environment (ACARA 2012).
Gearing down:
Focus on the fundamentals concepts of what corners and a sides are with basic shapes like
triangles and squares
Gearing up:
Introduce more complex shapes such irregular triangles or quadrilaterals, explain that sides and
corners can be found on almost any shape.
Materials:
-

Laminated shapes (a solid lined and dotted line for each):

o

Square, rectangle, triangle, circle, oval and rhombus

Who am I? worksheets (one per student)

Straws

Introduce (20 minutes)

Before the class begins I will make sure the appropriate materials are prepared and ready to be
utilised.
Who can tell me what this shape is?

Charmaine Pinheiro
I will be showing the class a laminated picture of a square on the white board.
How do you know it is a square?
We want the students to use describing words such a sides and corners. They may even describe
the sides as equal or the shape as 2D but that is not expected at this stage.
If they use sides or corners ask them to describe what these words mean to the class.
Further elaborate on the concrete definitions of sides and corners while pointing to the picture of
the square for the students to get a visual understanding.
Now I will bring out a dotted laminated outline of a square and stick it on the white board.
Who thinks they can trace the sides of this shape? Make sure you count out aloud to the class.
Who can show the class the corners of this shape? (Circle them) How many are there?
Now that the students have a clearer idea of what sides and corners are, work with them to create
rules/definitions for both words and add these words to a word wall. Make sure to elaborate on
sides as being straight to help students understand that circles do not have any sides as there are
no straight lines used.
Investigate (30 minutes)
Hand out an activity sheet called Who am I? for this activity students work with their table group (45 students) to find out which different shapes are being described by the number of sides and
corners it has. The students can get creative and colour in their shapes and give them faces.
With the descriptions students should come up with answers like: square, rectangle,
rhombus/diamond, triangle, circle or oval. Join back into a class group and work with trying to
differentiate why a square and rectangle have the same number of sides and corners but have
different names. Use straws to illustrate that a square has four equal sides and a rectangle has two
different pairs of even sides that are opposite.
Why is this a square? Why is this a rectangle? Why do they have different names but the same number
of corners and sides?
Reflect/Summarise (10 minutes)
Go through the words added to the word wall. Ask one student to read it to the class and show what
they are talking about on the appropriate laminated shapes.
Encourage the students, for homework, to be aware of any different shapes they find in their
surroundings and to count their sides and corners. Challenge them to find shapes that have more
than four sides (this will be useful for the next class).

Charmaine Pinheiro

Charmaine Pinheiro
Lesson 2
Lesson objectives:
-

EXPLORE the idea

The students will:

1. be able to identify various new shapes by name (pentagon, hexagon and octagon)
2. learn how to recognise these new shapes by the characteristics of their corners and
sides
3. work collaboratively with others to produce shapes with tools
Assessment:
Objective 1: Correctly be able to identify and name shapes by its number of corners and sides
Objective 2: Be able to work in a group to solve problems
Gearing down:
Focus only on introducing pentagons and how they differentiate from squares
Gearing up:
Challenge the class to create a 10 sided shape and discuss with them the properties of a decagon
Materials:
-

popsicle sticks of different colours (enough for each table group)

wool or string

laminated shapes:
o

pentagon, hexagon, octagon and decagon (for gearing up only)

geometric self-adhesive foam shapes (see Appendix 2.1)

Introduce (10 minutes)

Who can tell me what we learned about last lesson?
Now, were going to learn about some new and exciting shapes that you may not have heard of before.
Can someone tell me what this shape is called? Hold up a picture of a pentagon.
This shape is called a pentagon. Who can tell me what might make a pentagon different from a square
or a triangle? It has 5 sides and 5 corners. Repeat this with a hexagon and octagon.
Investigate/Explore (40 minutes)

Charmaine Pinheiro
Spend 10 minutes on a building shapes activity with coloured Popsicle sticks. Make the students work
in small groups. This activity will be similar to A, Bee, C, Preschools (2012) building shapes activity
(refer to Appendix 1). Go around the class and assess if the students are developing an understanding
of these new shapes and their characteristics.
Spend the next 10 minutes working with the whole class and getting them to work together to make
different shapes with wool or string (you may need to do this outside if the classroom is too small).
Show me a shape with 3 corners.
Show me an octagon.
For the larger shapes encourage the students to combine groups to solve the problem.
How do you know this is correct? Ask the class to count the sides and corners out loud together.
When working with squares and rectangles it may be useful to ask them to test if their sides are of the
correct length (equal).
Finally, spend 20 minutes for each student to create their own shapeosaurs (dinosaurs made from
shapes). The students will be given access to different foam shapes, that they have just learned, and
with 3 or more different shapes they are to make their own shapeosaur. Instruct them to record on a
separate piece of paper how many of each shape they used and the number of sides and corners
each shape has. This activity is similar to Little Family Funs (2013) build a dinosaur activity.
I used

4 squares . Each

square has

sides and

corners.

Reflect/Summarise (10 minutes)

Reflect on the work of a few students ask them to share what shapes they used and why.
Work with the class to create Word Wall entries for a pentagon, hexagon and an octagon.
Encourage the class to be aware of these new shapes in their everyday lives as you will be asking the
class about it in the next lesson.

Charmaine Pinheiro
Lesson 3
Lesson objectives:
-

EXPLAIN the idea

The students will:

1. be able to understand the difference between 2D and 3D shapes
2. be able to recognise new shapes by name (cube, rectangular prism, cylinder, pyramid, sphere,
cone)
3. learn how to identify these shapes by the characteristics of their corners, edges and faces
4. work autonomously to solve problems
Assessment:
Objective 1: Correctly be able to identify and name shapes by its number of corners, edges and
faces
Objective 2: Able to distinguish between 2D and 3D shapes
Objective 3: Be able to understand the real world application of 3D shapes
Gearing down:
Focus on basic 3D shapes (such as a cube and cylinder) and work from there
Gearing up:
Encourage students to think of other characteristics of these shapes like can it roll? or how many
different ways is the shape able to stand up? OR you could use more complex mathematical problems
what would I get if I added the number of faces on a cube with the number of faces on a cylinder?
Materials:
-

Paper, scissors and blutack/sticky tape

A class set of 3D shapes comprising of cubes, rectangular prisms, cylinders, pyramids,

spheres and cones (Appendix 3.1)

Rectangular prim nets

Picasso tiles (Appendix 3.2)

Introduce (10 minutes)

Quickly touch on what was learned last lesson. Who found some shapes when they got home? What
did you find? How many sides and corners did it have (draw it on the board)?

Charmaine Pinheiro

Teach/Explore (40 minutes)

Have the laminated shapes from last lesson up on the board. Can someone tell me what all of these
shapes have in common? Guide them to discovering that the shapes are flat (how do these shapes
feel?).
Who knows what the special name for flat shapes is? Further explain the properties of 2D shapes.
Can someone tell me what the difference is between this square and this shape (wooden cube)?
What is the special name for this kind of shape? Explain the concept of a 3D shape and how it is solid
rather than flat.
Explain that, like 2Ds shapes use special names like sides and corners, 3D shapes use special
describing words such as corners, edges and faces. Describe each characteristics using the cube
as an example.
When illustrating faces put a paper square on each square face of a cube. This will assist the students
greatly in their understanding of faces. While putting the faces on the cube help the students to
understand that 3D shapes are made from multiple 2D shapes.
Can someone tell me what shape the faces on this cube are?
How many faces are on this cube? If this is still difficult to answer use a large dice to show the class
the answer is 6.
Spend the next 15 minutes on the next activity Shape me up which is similar to Put the clothes on
the 3-D shapes (Gift of Curiosity 2014) (see Appendix 3.3). Students will work individually to trace
around wooden 3D shapes to discover that faces are flat just like 2D shapes. The difference is that
3D shapes are solid and are made up by 2D shapes. This activity should give students a hands on
understanding of what a face is and that an edge is where these faces connect. Go around the class
during this activity and provide support for those students who are struggling with the concept of 3D
shapes.
The next 15 minutes will be spent on the students creating their own 3D shape with the use of a blank
rectangular prism net in the image of themselves or someone they know called 3D Me (Appendix
3.4). This activity is aimed at making the students more aware of the orientation of faces. The
students will decorate their shapes and focus on what they can see from different angles e.g. the top
square is the top of someones head and the back rectangle is how someone will look like from
behind. Making real world links to things that are 3D (the human body) should give students a better

Charmaine Pinheiro
understanding of 3D shapes. When the students have completed their 3D shape put them all in a shape
like castle (this will be important for the next lesson) (similar to Appendix 3.2).

Reflect/Summarise (10 minutes)

Work with the class to create Word Wall entries for: 2D, 3D (face, edge and corner), cube, cylinder,
rectangular prism, sphere, cone and pyramid.

Charmaine Pinheiro
Lesson 4
Lesson objectives:
-

ELABORATE or Organising the Idea

The students will:

1. be able to recognise 3D shapes in a real world concept
2. work collaboratively and individually to solve problems
Assessment:
Objective 1: Correctly be able to identify and name shapes by its number of corners, edges and
faces
Objective 2: Able to distinguish between 2D and 3D shapes
Objective 3: Be able to understand the real world application of 3D shapes
Gearing down:
Focus only on the small 3D shapes
Gearing up:
Introduce different based pyramids and prisms to challenge the students
Materials:
-

Small real world 3D objects: coke can, dice, cereal box etc.

Laminated pictures of large 3D objects: pyramid, building etc.

A class set of 3D shapes comprising of cubes, rectangular prisms, cylinders, pyramids,

spheres and cones

Introduce (10 minutes)

Use the Word Wall to go over the aspects of 3D shapes that were covered in the previous lesson. Ask
a few students to come up to the front of the class to count the number of faces, edges and
corners of different shapes.
Investigate/Explore (45 minutes)
Today we actually have a very important task to complete. It seems as though our shapeosaurs
decided to be a bit naughty last night and they destroyed the shape city for all of our shape people!
We need to make sure our shapes have a home so today were going to rebuild shape city as a class.
But before we can do that we need to make sure we understand how 3D shapes can be used to create
structures.

Charmaine Pinheiro
Show the class small real world 3D objects like a coke can (cylinder), dice (cube), cereal box
(rectangular prism) and a ping pong ball (sphere). Can anyone else think of any other objects that are
3D shapes?
Now show the class some pictures of large 3D shapes. Make sure they understand that although the
picture is flat the image it still represents is 3D. With each picture ask someone new to tell the class
what 3D shape it is and how they know this.
Lastly, allow the students to work individually or together in small groups to create some kind of
home for their shapes with the use of both 2D and 3D shapes (using Picasso tiles). After they have
completed this all of their 3D homes will be placed next to each other to create a shape city.
What shape was used here? How many faces does this shape have? Why did you use this shape
here?
Reflect/Summarise (5 minutes)
Feedback on the shape city as a whole and congratulate the students on their effort and hard work.
How did everyone like that task? Why/why not?
The world is full with wonderful 3D shapes encourage the class to search for them!

Charmaine Pinheiro
Lesson 5
Lesson objectives:
-

EVALUATE

The students will:

1. be tested on their knowledge of 2D and 3D shapes and their terminology
Assessment:
Objective 1: Recognise and classify familiar 2D shapes and 3D objects using obvious features
Gearing down: Work individually with those students who are struggling to ensure they understand
the main concepts of 2D and 3D shapes
Gearing up: Introduce more challenging concepts such as a different based pyramids and prisms
Materials:
-

Test work sheets (see Appendices 4.1, 4.2 and 4.3)

Shape games (see Appendices 4.4, 4.5 and 4.6)

Introduce (5 minutes)
We have a very fun lesson planned for today with many fun games working with all the 2D and 3D
shapes you have learned about recently. But before we can get into that we have a small test to get us
started.
Investigate/Explore (45 minutes)
Have the students work on the test individually and when everyone has completed their tests split the
class into small groups and rotate through the activities. The 3 shape games are snap (Appendix 4.4),
memory (Appendix 4.5) and dominos (Appendix 4.6).
While kids are playing the games you can quickly look through the tests and see what the class in
generally has had trouble with and which students seem to be struggling the most all round. Take this
time to work with them through the games.
Reflect/Summarise (10 minutes)
Feedback on the tests and go through some of the content they struggled with the most.
How did you like learning about different shapes?
What was hardest about learning this topic?
What was fun?

Charmaine Pinheiro

Conclusion and Evaluation

Benefits of this topic
This topic develops an understanding of core concepts of 2D and 3D shapes in children. With the
ability to classify 2D shapes and 3D objects using obvious features, children are able to utilise these
skills outside of the classroom and apply them practically in the outside world. Not only are there real
world applications for this topic it also lays the foundations for learning in Year 2 as students will be
learning how to Describe and draw two-dimensional shapes, with and without digital technologies
(ACARA 2012) as well as learning to Describe the features of three-dimensional objects (ACARA
2012).
Assessment
Assessment strategies that were utilised predominately involved classroom observations and written
class work. Engaging the students with multiple hands on demonstrations and questions would help
develop each individuals understanding of 2D and 3D features. During this time it would be beneficial
to observe the behaviour of the students. Which students are consistently contributing? Which ones
are not? Why? These are all important considerations when assessing where a child is
developmentally and whether they understand the content you are teaching or not. It is important to
remember that they may know the answer but they feel uncomfortable putting their hand up to answer
the question. Conversely, it is important to assess the physical work of the children as well. The shape
work sheets in lesson 5 would be a good opportunity in which to understand which children are
struggling and with what aspect of the topic. Gathering this specific data will give the teacher an
opportunity to help these specific children in learning what they are struggling with. It would be
beneficial to utilise an observational assessment rubric to assess each students understanding of the
content (refer to Appendix 5).

Charmaine Pinheiro
References
A, Bee, C, Preschool 2012, Building shapes, A, Bee, C, Preschool Blogspot, viewed 7 April 2015,
<http://abeecpreschool.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/building-shapes.html>.
Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) 2012, The Australian
Curriculum: Mathematics, Commonwealth of Australia, viewed 1 March 2015,
<http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/Mathematics/Curriculum/F-10>.
Gift of Curiosity 2014, Put the clothes on the 3-D shapes, Gift of Curiosity: Sparking childrens
creativity and learning, viewed 8 April 2015, <http://www.giftofcuriosity.com/teaching-3-d-shapesput-the-clothes-on/>.
Little Family Fun 2013, Build a dinosaur: Easy activity for kids, Little Family Fun, viewed 7 April
2015, <http://www.littlefamilyfun.com/2013/09/build-dinosaur.html>.

Charmaine Pinheiro
Appendices
Appendix 1
<http://abeecpreschool.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/building-shapes.html>

Appendix 2.1
<http://allwomenstalk.com/10-things-for-your-kids-craft-bin/6/>

Appendix 2.2
<http://www.littlefamilyfun.com/2013/09/build-dinosaur.html>

Appendix 3.1

Charmaine Pinheiro
<http://www.teaching.com.au/product?KEY_ITEM=MATH08&KEY_ALIAS=MATH08>

Appendix 3.2
<http://www.ebay.com/itm/Picasso-Tiles-100-piece-Set-Magnet-Building-Clear-3D-MagneticBuilding-Blocks-/201285092139>

Appendix 3.3

Charmaine Pinheiro
<http://www.giftofcuriosity.com/teaching-3-d-shapes-put-the-clothes-on/>

Appendix 3.4
<http://pixelpapercraft.com/print>

Appendix 4.1

Charmaine Pinheiro
<http://www.teachersnotebook.com/product/kingvirtue/geometric-figures-3-d-solid-figures-practicesheets-1-clear-shapes>

Appendix 4.2
<https://www.pinterest.com/pin/204702745539106499/>

Appendix 4.3
<http://e-classroom.co.za/caps-content/mathematics/>

Charmaine Pinheiro

Appendix 4.4
<https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Geometric-Solids-Real-Life-Objects-3-PartMontessori-Cards-121776>

Appendix 4.5
<http://lifeovercs.com/4-free-activities-for-learning-shapes/>

Appendix 4.6
<https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/3D-Shape-Dominoes-Game-126728>

Charmaine Pinheiro

Appendix 5
Observational Assessment Rubric Example (Out of 5)

Student
Name

Shape
Names

Joe
Kate

4
4

2D Shapes
Understanding of
Terminology
Side
Corner
5
4

5
4

Shape
Names
2
1

3D Shapes
Understanding of
Terminology
Face
Edge
Corner

4
5
5
3
3
3