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Last Friday I was fortunate enough to have the time, energy, and forethought to plan a lesson that went off swimmingly and I want to share its pros and cons here
My students have been honing their graphing, solving, and analyzing skills since returning from Winter Break. I noticed a severe lack of comfort in manipulating fractions as well, so I wanted them to be exposed to that as well. In order to bring it all together, I had the of idea of letting the students create graphs on graham crackers using icing. If you take a graham cracker and rotate in 45 degrees in either direction, the holes perfectly line up to create a grid. It was wonderful.
I explained it to my students exactly this way:
![Picture](/uploads/6/3/4/7/6347286/1361328098.png)
Level Two consisted of systems involving fractional coefficients or negative numbers. They needed two graham crackers to create (an added incentive).
Level Three consisted of a system of linear inequalities involving shading (translation: more icing). It was quite difficult and only one student achieved it. Unfortunately, he had to go to his next class before graphing it on the graham crackers.
![Picture](/uploads/6/3/4/7/6347286/1029218.jpg?200)
Overall the activity was a great success - almost all students were working (even those who had previously given up). I was able to increase the skill of many and reinforce the need to come to tutoring for some. I would highly recommend using this lesson if you can in the future. Just be sure to share your own hashtag!