During one of our professional development days, our history teacher made a plea to the principal to perform a prank on one of the students. He wanted to fill up their locker with “fun balls,” the balls usually used for a ball pit at Chucky Cheez.’ He was only allowed to do this as long as there was some type of lesson build around it so I felt obliged to write one based on what we were learning lately. Here is that lesson!
As seen this morning, fun balls aren’t just for little kids anymore. It really makes people laugh early in the morning and it is fun to pull pranks on each other. The team that finishes the most work on these experiments will get to pick a person to pull the same prank on, with the correct amount of balls to fill the locker! There are a couple assignments, the more you do, the better your chances are to pick the next victim! All teams must at least complete Exercise #1.
Exercise #1 Measurement of the ball diameter
The circumference (distance around) of a ball is . Use a piece of string to wrap around the ball then measure the length of the string.
You will want to get a few different measurements on this to be able to complete this whole assignment so have at least 3 people in your group measure the string and perform all the calculations.
- The string measures ___ ___.___ =
(find on the calculator and use it in your calculations for the most accurate this way. If you can’t use it, use the value of 3.14)
- The radius is then: = ____.___ ___ cm (round to hundredths place)
- The diameter is twice the radius (d=2r). Calculate this and write it here: d= ___.___ ___
- Round your number to the tenths place correctly:
D = ___.___ cm
- Change your number to millimeters:
(Cross out units that appear in both the numerator and denominator)
Show your work to the teacher, the teacher will give you the specifications written on the package of the balls, this will be your “actual” value that you will use in the % error calculations.
Exercise #2 % Error Calculations
% Error is calculated by this equation:
Calculate % Error using three different values that you found:
Measured Value | % Error | % Error rounded to tenths place |
Exercise #3 Percentage (%) of Color
This activity is to find the correct % of each color at your table. Fill in the table below to help you with your calculations. Please round to the thousands place on your decimal and to the tenths place on your percent.
Color | Amount(count) | Fractional amount | Amount as a decimal
|
Amount as a percent %
Decimal*100 |
Blue | ||||
Green | ||||
Red | ||||
Yellow | ||||
Totaleach column |
Question: If your table’s balls represented of the colors found in a large container of these balls, how many of each color would you expect have if the bag contained 1,200 balls?
Exercise #4 Volumetric calculations
How many of these balls could fit into a locker?
The volume of a ball is calculated to be . Use the actual measurement of the ball to calculate the volume of the ball. Remember that radius (r) is ½ the diameter (d).
USE THE cm VALUE FOR THE RADIUS!!!
The volume calculation tells you how much space one ball will take up. Calculate the volume of a locker and try to figure out how many balls can fit into the locker:
Calculate the volume of the locker by measuring the following with a piece of string:
Depth (how far in): ___ ___.___ cm
Width (how wide): ___ ___.___ cm
Height (how tall): ___ ___.___ cm
Use this formula to figure out the total volume of the locker (the shape is a rectangular prism):
V= ___ ___ ___ ,___ ___ ___.___
With these two formulas for volume, how would you calculate how many balls would fit into one locker? Do you feel this would be completely accurate? Why or why not?