The Situation(s)
Giant Sicilian pizza
Giant Sicilian delivery box
The Challenge(s)
- How many square inches is the Giant Sicilian pizza?
- How many square inches is the Giant Sicilian’s delivery box?
Question(s) To Ask
These questions may be useful in helping students down the problem solving path:
- What is a guess that is too low?
- What is a guess that is too high?
- What is your best guess?
- What factors may affect the accuracy of our answer?
- What information do we need to figure it out?
Consider This
My favorite part about this problem is that neither answer that Modern Marvels gives will likely match the answer students come up with. Students will have to decide whether or not the answer is close enough to be considered correct. As it turns out, Modern Marvels got one correct and the other is actually wrong.
This problem will likely begin by students first calculating the area of the 54″ square pizza and getting 2,916 square inches (54″ x 54″). When you play the answer and students hear “that’s almost 3,000 square inches of steaming hot pizza,” they will have to determine whether that answer seems reasonable and decide on what they think the voice over should have said.
The second problem is where it gets more interesting. Students will have to determine the dimensions of the pizza delivery box to find its area. If the pizza is a 54″ square, then the delivery box must be at least an inch or two bigger on each side. That gives an area of 3,025 to 3,136 square inches. When you play the answer and students hear “the giant pizza delivery box is 56 square inches”, I hope minor chaos ensues. Students will be forced to question or defend their answers. In this case, Modern Marvels is certainly wrong and should have said it is either “a square that is 56 inches on each side” or “3,136 square inches”.
What You’ll Need
- Answer to “How many square inches is the Giant Sicilian pizza?”
- Answer to “How many square inches is the Giant Sicilian’s delivery box?”
Content Standard(s)
- CCSS 3.MD.5 Recognize area as an attribute of plane figures and understand concepts of area measurement.
- CCSS 3.MD.6 Measure areas by counting unit squares (square cm, square m, square in, square ft, and improvised units).
- CCSS 3.MD.7 Relate area to the operations of multiplication and addition.
- CCSS 4.MD.3 Apply the area and perimeter formulas for rectangles in real world and mathematical problems. For example, find the width of a rectangular room given the area of the flooring and the length, by viewing the area formula as a multiplication equation with an unknown factor.
- CCSS 4.NBT.3 Use place value understanding to round multi-digit whole numbers to any place.
Source(s)
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