The purpose of this activity is to engage students in finding locations from descriptions given and using these to solve a problem.
This activity assumes the students have experience in the following areas:
The problem is sufficiently open ended to allow the students freedom of choice in their approach. It may be scaffolded with guidance that leads to a solution, and/or the students might be given the opportunity to solve the problem independently.
The example responses at the end of the resource give an indication of the kind of response to expect from students who approach the problem in particular ways.
It was a cloudy day.
A learner pilot took a training flight in a small plane from Invercargill Airport to Oban Airport.
He followed the bearing he calculated before take-off.
Unfortunately, the learner pilot had forgotten to factor in drift from the strong Westerly wind. The instructor stopped him from landing as they passed over the sea.
Their East-North Grid Reference was:
1260000 mE, 4796000 mN.
Find the angle of deviation from the original flight plan that occurred.
The following prompts illustrate how this activity can be structured around the phases of the Mathematics Investigation Cycle.
Introduce the problem. Allow students time to read it and discuss in pairs or small groups.
Discuss ideas about how to solve the problem. Emphasise that, in the planning phase, you want students to say how they would solve the problem, not to actually solve it.
Allow students time to work through their strategy and find a solution to the problem.
Allow students time to check their answers and then either have them pair share with other groups or ask for volunteers to share their solution with the class.
The student calculates, with guidance, values in standard form, giving an answer to an appropriate degree of accuracy.
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The student calculates values in standard form, giving an answer to an appropriate degree of accuracy. The student incorporates wider aspects of the context to make a valued judgement.
Printed from https://meaningfulmaths.nt.edu.au/mmws/nz/resource/safe-landings at 8:52pm on the 26th February 2024