This Cyberchase activity provides students with practice in accumulating positive and negative point totals in the context of a competition. The activity is motivated by the For Real segment of a Cyberchase episode that emphasizes positive and negative numbers.
1 hour
Competing for the Northern Hemisphere Games QuickTime Video
1. Have the students work in pairs for this activity.
2. Read the following to the students: "Harry wants to qualify to compete in the Northern Hemisphere Games in New Orleans. He must compete in 4 events and score enough total points to qualify.
3. Distribute the Handout: Will Harry Qualify?
4. Ask the students to work through handout.
5. When the students have finished the problems on the handout, have them compare their answers, and discuss any differences in the answers between different pairs of students.
6. Tell the students that they will watch a video segment of Harry's qualifying competition and scoring.
7. Show the Competing for the Northern Hemisphere Games QuickTime Video.
8. From the video segement, students will be able to tell whether or not their answers to the handout were correct. Discuss with students who answered incorrectly how to reason the addition problems correctly.
Assessment: Level A: Students are asked to work through addition of positive and negative numbers, this time in the context of temperature changes through the course of a week.
Assessment: Level B: Students are asked to order the elevations of a number of cities from lowest to highest elevation relative to sea level, and to calculate the difference in elevation between the cities with the highest and lowest elevations.