Year 5 disappeared from school last week and spent their Numeracy lesson at one of our local supermarkets, IGA, investigating kilograms and grams. Upon arrival, the children were given a list of ‘weighty’ challenges to complete. These included finding the mass of a variety of items in store, working out the lightest and heaviest objects and also ordering items by weight.
Year 5 was then taken into IGA’s warehouse where they saw how really heavy objects were moved around the store. Luckily, they were able to solve the challenges set by the IGA staff and, as a reward, were allowed to feel the temperatures of their large walk-in freezers. At first everyone thought 34 degrees Fahrenheit felt cold, until they learnt the true meaning of the word. The rooms of 0 degrees and -15 degrees Fahrenheit were unforgettably cold….. Brrrrr!
Just before they left, IGA kindly arranged for everyone to each have a go on the checkout tills and to use their scales to weight some fruit. We left owing $17.56… Thank you Ken for helping us – the children thought the trip was worth its weight in gold and really felt that they had practised a range of math skills and learned a lot about measuring weight!