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Geoboards

Age 7 to 11
Challenge Level Yellow starYellow star
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Geraldine and Suzanne sent in their solutions to this problem. They said:

We think there are five different squares which you can make on a 4 by 4 geoboard. Here is a picture of three of them:

three squares

Here is a picture of the other two which only have pegs at their corners, not along their sides:

tilted squares

The pink square in the second picture has an area of two square units. We don't think you can make a square with an area of three square units as the next size up square we have has sides of 2 which means its area is 4 square units (too big).

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Can you make five differently sized squares from the interactive tangram pieces?

Polydron

This activity investigates how you might make squares and pentominoes from Polydron.

Tiles on a Patio

How many ways can you find of tiling the square patio, using square tiles of different sizes?

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The NRICH Project aims to enrich the mathematical experiences of all learners. To support this aim, members of the NRICH team work in a wide range of capacities, including providing professional development for teachers wishing to embed rich mathematical tasks into everyday classroom practice.

NRICH is part of the family of activities in the Millennium Mathematics Project.

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