Room 8 were quite serious about this math's challenge. We found out we had no real idea about how many balloons might fit. the idea of trying balloons on a similar car seemed like a good way to estimate, rather than just guess, the amount that could fit in Mr Devine's car. So Mr Cooper suggested we try his car. It wouldn't be a very good trial if all the rubbish in his car took up space for the balloons. Wow 26 helpers cleaned his car in no time, two car-seats removed and all.
We checked with Mrs Mac about the size of the balloons and then used the balloon she approved of as a 'master' balloon. We soon learnt that the shape of the balloons meant we wouldn't fill all of the car, there would be lots of gaps.
The balloon pump didn't work that well, so we just huffed and we puffed. After lots of balloon failures we ended up with 80 balloons filling the back of Mr Cooper's car. People had made a 'best guess' before filling Mr Cooper's car. After filling his car people were allowed to alter their estimate for Mr Devine's car. The end result was 167 BALLOONS. WOW........ a number of people came very close to that number.
We learnt:
- Balloons aren't good for stacking neatly
- Filling a car with balloons on a windy day if difficult
- Countdowns balloons were expensive at $4.40 for 40, whilst Pak n Save were $6 for 100 and better quality
- Most of us underestimated how many balloons would fit in the car at the beginning
- We learnt more about the volume of 3D shapes
- We need to have a 'master balloon size' in order to ensure the activity had some sense of fairness
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