Third Blog Polygon

Class: III

Subject: Mathematics

Topic: Polygon

In this blog, I will be writing on the teaching of the topic “Polygon” from the textbook of Mathematics, grade three. Particularly I went with the topic on ‘Polygon’. Among many tools of ICT, I chose to make appropriate use of the Power Point Presentation graphics to teach about the Polygon shape to children of lower primary, grade three.

I believed that the PowerPoint Presentation on Polygon shapes will help my children in engaging themselves in multiple learning styles. It will increase their visual impact of polygon shapes, improve the audience impact, enrich curriculum with interdisciplinary, and break out topics into understandable points.  

Creation of the teaching material

I created the PowerPoint Presentation by making best use of all the features and tools available in it. It was easier for me to integrate graphics and animations into my slides to illustrate the key points of the topic.  I made sure that color combinations were put into consideration while preparing every slide show using PowerPoint. I used good color combination that made the text readable. Some text were found to be read clearly and easily when good combinations were used while some text were found to be bad for those color blindness  when bad color combinations were used. I kept good contrast between the text and the background. Background of the PowerPoint slides was very important to teaching and learning. Since I was preparing the slides for grade three children, I used the background according to their standard and interests. Usually children of lower primary are fond of different colors. So I made use of attractive colors. In case of text font, I made use of two different fonts differentiating the topics and the body parts. I used different font color whenever I wanted to highlight an important point in my slides rather than Italics, Bolds or underlining. To create the Polygon shapes, I used the various shapes available in the PowerPoint and used fill color to make the shapes colorful, bright and attractive. Making use of the different colors for the shapes will help me to gain the attention of the learners. I added different animations in texts as well to make it interesting, lively and attractive for the viewers. As a teacher while preparing the PowerPoint slides, I was conscious of the use of slide layout tools.  I used bullet to state my points rather than continuous prose. The PowerPoint Presentation on Polygon shapes will help me to convey the meaning of Polygon shapes, examples of Polygon shapes, features of Polygon shapes, types and name of polygon to the children. The PowerPoint Presentation will serve as content-based materials for me in teaching the topic polygon shapes to my children of lower primary grade three. To see whether my children have understood the topic taught through PowerPoint Presentation or not, I included a very simple activity for the children.

Activity: Sorting the polygon

Q. Which of the following Polygons are concave and which are convex? Name the polygon.

Instructions for the use of content-based material

Teaching learning materials in teaching are crucial to the success of student achievement. To integrate ICT in teaching material is not as easy as one think. I could not think of any other tool of ICT to develop my teaching resource on the topic ‘Polygon Shapes’. I ended up creating a PowerPoint Presentation on Polygon shapes by making full use of all the features available in the PowerPoint. I developed the material with a set of objectives in my mind. Through the presentation, I want to ensure my children of grade three to:

·         learn the concept of polygon

·         know the features of polygon shape

·         know the features of not a polygon shape

·          know the types and name of polygon

·         know the spelling of polygon shapes correctly

·         relate their live with the polygon shape and make connections

I will use the material throughout the lesson i.e. lesson introduction, lesson development and lesson conclusion. Through the first slide of the presentation, children will be introduced with the topic of the lesson as ‘Polygon’. The picture of some basic shapes on the first slide along with the topic will give the children a very crystal clear concept on the polygon. Starting from the second till Tenth slide of the presentation, children will be taught on the main contents of the topic. They will be taken to the lesson development. They will learn about the definition of polygon along with its features, types and name cited with examples. Children will be able to see the shape with its description on the slide and it will not create confusion among the shapes in children. Children will also perform an activity after the content has been conveyed to them. The designed activity will help the children to further enhance their understating on Polygon. The final slide of the presentation will be used for lesson conclusion where I will ask some children to recapitulate the key points learnt and give examples of some polygon shapes.