Pi Day : Making a Pi Necklace

URL: http://mathforum.org/teachers/middle/activities/pi_day.html

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Diana Funke teaches mathematics at Davisville Middle School in North Kingstown, RI. Her students make a Pi necklace for Pi Day to reinforce the idea that some numbers never repeat or end. They assign a color to each digit (including 0) and then string beads of those colors into a necklace, using the digits of Pi as their guide.

Summary

Subject keyword(s)	Education, Famous numbers, Irrational numbers, Mathematics, Number and operations, Number concepts, Pi, Process skills, Visualization
Grade level	Elementary School, Middle School, Vocational/Professional Development Education
Intended audience	Educator
Resource type	Instructional Material
Resource format	text, text/html
Rights	1994-2009 Drexel University. All rights reserved.

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Title	Middle School Portal: Math and Science Pathways (MSP2)
Link	http://msteacher2.org/
Description	The Middle School Portal 2: Math and Science Pathways (MSP2) supports middle grades educators with high-quality, standards-based resources and promotes collaboration and knowledge-sharing among its users. Educators use MSP2 to increase content knowledge in science, mathematics, and appropriate pedagogy for youth ages 10 to 15. MSP2 employs social networking and digital tools to foster dynamic experiences that promote creation, modification, and sharing of resources, facilitate professional development, and support the integration of technology into practice. MSP2 is a project of the Ohio State University College of Education and Human Ecology, National Middle School Association, and Education Development Center, Inc., and is funded by the National Science Foundation. The partners integrate resources, tools, and services across projects, and support multiple methods of resource discovery to meet the needs of this audience.
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Content contained within the resource

The Math Forum Pi Day Back to Middle School Teachers' Place   Making a Pi Necklace by Diana Funke As a 7th grade math teacher, I like to make mathematics as visual as possible. For Pi Day, my students make Pi necklaces. I use Pi as a way of introducing my students to the idea of an irrational number. After studying decimals that terminate or repeat, I ask them to bring in a can and we compare the circumference to the diameter by dividing C by d. This is how they find out what Pi is all about. I have them make a Pi necklace to reinforce the idea that some numbers never repeat or end. We usually use from 100 to 300 beads, depending on the size of the bead. They assign a color to each digit (including 0) and then string beads of those colors into a necklace, using the digits of Pi as their guide. Some students make their own beads with polymer clay and others string store-bought beads of all sizes. The first bead, representing the number three, is bigger than the rest. (In the illustration, the necklace has a big silver triangular "bead" as the whole number 3 part of Pi.) At 1:59 P.M. we all stop what we are doing and wish everyone a Happy Pi Day!   Diana Funke, Mathematics teacher Davisville Middle School North Kingstown, RI ride1033@ride.ri.net   [Privacy Policy] [Terms of Use] Home || The Math Library || Quick Reference || Search || Help  © 1994-2012 Drexel University. All rights reserved. http://mathforum.org/ The Math Forum is a research and educational enterprise of the Goodwin College of Professional Studies.sarah@mathforum.org