Polydron

This activity investigates how you might make squares and pentominoes from Polydron.

Multilink Cubes

If you had 36 cubes, what different cuboids could you make?

Cereal Packets

How can you put five cereal packets together to make different shapes if you must put them face-to-face?

Penta Place

Stage: 2 Challenge Level:

Why do this problem?

This challenge is a good extension to the usual one of just finding the pentominoes. It also gives an opening for discussing further extensions to the challenge - eg what about where the front door to the houses would be?

Possible approach

Start with finding the shapes that are required for the rest of the challenge by presenting the pupils with interlocking cubes that can represent the squares.

Key questions

Have you checked that no two are the same?

How did you go about finding all the different designs?

Possible extension

Suggestions from the pupils to the question that start ,"I wonder what would happen if we. . . . ?"

Possible support

It would be helpful for some pupils to have squared paper that has the same size squares as the cubes they are using.

Working systematically. Addition & subtraction. Visualising. Combinations. Tessellations. Multiplication & division. Interlocking cubes. Interactivities. Investigations. Factors and multiples.

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