As part of our Year 10 Maths curriculum ‘Supersize My Maths Brain’, the students were given the task of creating a list of non-perishable food items to be gifted as a food parcel to a family within our school community who are struggling. Armed with a budget of fifty dollars (which was donated by the class children) food/grocery items were chosen using a number of online supermarket forums. The students had to consider carefully their grocery items and ensure they provided essential and non-perishable items, along with a number of other factors.
During their time, each class learnt new and different things. Students were divided into groups to work in collaboration with other classmates and competed within homerooms.
Kathrina Bacay (10BRN) states… “Personally, this project allowed me to learn and improve many skills, being able to incorporate this into a real-life situation while helping a struggling family was also rewarding. Exchanging ideas with my partner, we were able to understand each other’s different perspectives, incorporating new ideas and develop our project through engaging communication.”
Each group came up with their own criteria for what they believed should be in their chosen food parcel. The criteria included nutrition, quantity, quality, price and variety. With this criterion, groups were able to create a list of food items to be in their food parcel. However, because the budget was only fifty dollars, the price of each item was highly scrutinized.
This is where we incorporated a number of our maths skills: integers, ratios, standard form, significant figure, currency conversion, percentages, and rates. Items chosen, were compared to one another by calculating the cost per unit. For example, if a can of corn was 90c containing 400g, and another was 50c per 300g, we found the cost price per 100g then chose which was the best value for money. While doing so, we noticed that it was important to know specifically, where the locations of the stores were, as different locations of the same stores had different prices for the same product!
Once all groups had prepared their items, they presented to the class and the class voted on who they thought provided the best food parcel. On Monday, 11 April, the class winners packed their food parcels and presented them to the other maths teachers, the special character team and the Year 10 dean (Mrs. Al-Rubaie).
Overall, it was a wonderful experience, knowing that we not only improved our maths skills, but also helped a family of our school community for the better.
Photo by Mary Aguirre (Year 12)
