Making Maths: Walking Through a Playing Card?

Stage: 2 and 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

In this activity you are going to cut up a small sheet of paper (or an old playing card) and make a hole big enough to walk through. Sounds impossible? Read on..

What you need:
Scissors
Pens
Paper (try a sheet of A4 first) or small card


1) Fold the paper/ card in half lengthways

2) Divide the paper into 16 sections as shown by the lines below

3) Cut along all of the lines that are drawn
4) Taking care to leave the end strips intact, cut through the fold that you originally made when you folded the paper lengthways
5) Open out the paper and start walking!

This activity features in our December 2008 Advent Calendar .

The NRICH Project aims to enrich the mathematical experiences of all learners. To support this aim, members of the NRICH team work in a wide range of capacities, including providing professional development for teachers wishing to embed rich mathematical tasks into everyday classroom practice. More information on many of our other activities can be found here.
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NRICH is part of the family of activities in the Millennium Mathematics Project.