Ideas to Make Ratio and Proportion Unit Pop?

[Deborah Leslie]

Hi!  I am in need of some ideas, experiences, critique, and feedback! 

First, my name is Deborah Leslie, and I am currently pursuing my degree in Math and Secondary Education at Aurora University. For my education class, I need to create a relevant unit plan using differentiated instruction and assessment that involves my content area (math), literacy skills, and education standards. 

Since I plan to teach high school algebra, I have chosen to create a unit on Ratio and Proportion. Beginning with the end in mind, here are some of the specific items that I want my students to know and be able to do:

• demonstrate and apply a knowledge of ratios and proportions
• make indirect measurements using proportions
• interpret scale drawings and models using blueprints and maps
• make scale drawings and models with or without technology
• know the history and special nature of the golden ratio (golden rectangle)
• know career fields that use ratios and proportions
• understand and use the vocabulary of the unit
• communicate mathematics clearly to others
• know that a variety of strategies can be used to solve a problem
• apply mathematics in contexts outside of math

So far, I found: 

Assessment Idea to build a dream bedroom using scale models: 

Lesson plan involving art and proportion from the Art Institute of Chicago:

Application problems plus an example of a career field involving ratio and proportion from NASA: 

Additional resources from a McDougal Littel Algebra 1 textbook with links to examples of career fields, vocabulary, and content practice: 

Collaborative educational games: 

Worksheet with a proportion proof:

Grid drawing activity that can scale up or scale down the size of an image--instructions, example, and  templates: 

History and application of the golden ratio/rectangle from Donald in Mathmagic Land:

I have several other ideas for activities and the final assessment, but I would first love some input, feedback, and some more ideas on how to connect the topic with pop culture and how to provide more differentiated instruction to appeal to multiple intelligences.

Thank you for your thoughts!

DL

[Shelly Gibson]

For one unit I used edu.glogster.com

The students made an interactive "poster" that taught the concepts. We took all of them and put in on a "pageflakes" so students could vote for the best project! The students loved working together as teams to come up with creative ways to explain the concept (in your case ratios). They can upload videos, add links and design the poster to be quite unique.

This is a great way to differentiate instruction/assessment.

[Shelly Gibson]

I just saw the link to Story of 1! It is located right here on the Discussion Forum (by Ryan Goble) .

Start the video and fast forward to 19:35. He then begins to talk about math and music and the "ratio" (1:2) of harmonious notes!

Enjoy!

[MariaD]

Start with an idea of operation-based equivalence of relations, and use multiples (at least threes) of numbers. Ask each kid to come up with a relation, e.g. "Sally gets three more candy than John, and Kara gets two more than Sally." Then provide many (more than three) examples of such a relation:
John, Sally, Kara
3, 6, 8
5, 8, 10
7, 10, 12
100, 103, 105

When everybody got the general idea of "keeping the relationship constant," use traditional multiplicative proportions with pairs of numbers as one example within this example space. Basically, you need a larger example space for kids to see how such systems work. You can do it with kids as young as four of five, if relationships are qualitative or semi-qualitative (hands-on).

[Ryan Goble]

Shelly & Maria - thank you so much for sharing your great ideas!

If I could add a few cents - you have a fun toon you can use on assignment sheets.

Bill Nye does a section on Proportional Reasoning - Bill makes the scene, using proportional reasoning to size up the famous Hollywood sign, which he figures is sure to make him the toast of Tinseltown. on the Solving for X DVD.

Here's an interesting lesson around gas mileage and ratio

Here's a cool lesson about jazz and ratio - very cool.

I probably should have posted this "how to" in math as you can use ratios to easily create a guitar:
FILM/HOW-TO ARTICLE: 'It Might Get Loud' esp. when you build your o...

That inspired me to look for a cheaper "build an instrument to learn ratio and proportion" lesson - after about an hour of surfing I found two great ratio/proportion labs where students can create rubber band or woodwind (using a straw) instruments - very inquiry based and student centered.

Check out this lesson on wind instruments:

WIND INSTRUMENTS - And this one on rubber band instruments!

In my opinion these are really incredible lessons, and it looks like it was part of some Idaho math outreach project. I found this site explaining the program but found that the actual site - http://www.mathinthemiddle.org/ - seems to be a dead link. That is a total bummer as this is a very cool set of interdisciplinary lessons. They also have this cool - math in the middle of oceans programming that is MIA as well.

I wrote IPTV to see what is up with the site - student centered, inquiry based stuff is fun for students. Maybe they'll write back!

Hope this adds to your ideas!

RRG:)

[Deborah Leslie]

Thank you Maria and Shelly and Ryan for the ideas! It's great to get a more experienced perspective on the unit! Now I just need to sort through all the ideas, and try to put together a cohesive unit.

Muchas gracias!
Deb