Ms. Greenberg's Class: Tangram Puzzles

Greetings Grade 5's!

Now that we have wrapped up our Math unit on Data Management, we are going to begin a new unit on Number Sense and Numeration. This is a unit that I can guarantee is going to be a lot of fun, and we will have many interactive activities in class.

In class on Monday we are going to make our own Tangram puzzles and then use them for a series of Math activities. What’s a Tangram puzzle you may be wondering…?

A Tangram puzzle consists of seven pieces, called tans, which fit together to form a shape of some sort. The goal is to form specific shapes with the seven pieces. The shape has to contain all the pieces, which may not overlap each other.

A Tangram puzzle looks like this:

Please read this short paragraph about the origins of the Tangram puzzle and we will discuss it in class further.

Many years ago, in China, there lived a man called Mr. Tan. Of all his possessions, he most treasured an exquisite porcelain square tile. One day, he heard that the Emperor of China was coming to his village. To show his great admiration for and loyalty to the Emperor, Mr. Tan decided to offer his very precious tile to the Emperor as a gift. In great excitement, he began to polish his tile so that it would shine. As he handled the tile in different ways, to polish every surface, he dropped it. The porcelain tile broke into the seven pieces of the tangram puzzle. Mr. Tan was so very unhappy. As he wiped away his tears, he thought that if he could put the pieces back together, he would have the square tile again. Mr. Tan thought it would be easy to do, but it took him a very long time. While he was trying to form the square, he discovered lots of interesting two dimensional shapes.

Please click on this link to see how we are going to make our Tangram puzzles in class.

Tangram puzzle pieces can be used to make many different shapes: