Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Simple Slope Activity

Last week we started studying slope in Algebra I, and I needed a simple activity to inject some fun and creativity into our routine. I found this simple lesson plan on the Lessons Plan Page and decided to adapt this part of it for use in my class:
Students are given a sheet of graph paper and asked to create any picture they want using a minimum of 10 points. They may use only straight lines (no smiley faces allowed!)

Students label each point, then use the formula to evaluate the slope of each line. Students label the lines as positive, negative, zero, or undefined slope.
As simple as the directions are, I knew my students needed examples, so I drew two of them. They also get extremely frustrated when they make the smallest mistake, and constantly beg for extra copies of the same paper, so I gave them two blank graphs to make one picture. I left out the part about having students label each point, as I thought that would make these small graphs too crowded. I used graphs from the free printable graph paper resources I shared a few months ago.

You can easily print this document as one double-sided 1/2 size page to save paper: print 2 copies, and turn the second one to the opposite orientation of the original. Then make your copies double sided and cut in the middle.