The following examples of student work illustrate achievement at the mathematics standards for years 5, 6, and 7.
The task used in this illustration was part of a unit on waste, packaging, and recycling, stemming from a school-wide focus on sustainability. The unit was based on the Material World (from the science learning area), but this particular task also had links to achievement objectives for number strategies, number knowledge, and measurement from the mathematics and statistics learning area in The New Zealand Curriculum.
The Task
Breakdown of Waste Timeline
- Select some food and packaging items from the table that the class created after last week’s research.
Time that items found in school lunchboxes take to break downFoodApple core: 2 monthsBanana skin: 4 weeksOrange skin: 5 weeksSandwich crust: 2 weeksLeftover noodles: 6 weeksBread: 12 daysPackagingPlastic bag: 10 yearsPaper bag: 8 weeksPlastic wrap: 25 yearsGreaseproof paper: 8 weeksPlastic water bottle: 450 years
- Draw a timeline. Place your selected items on the timeline to show how long each item takes to break down.
- Choose one food and one packaging item from your timeline and calculate the difference between the times that they take to break down.
Some features of students’ work used to make judgments in relation to the mathematics standards are described on the pages linked below. (Names used for students are fictional.)
Breakdown of Waste: Illustrating the year 5 standard
Breakdown of Waste: Illustrating the year 6 standard
Breakdown of Waste: Illustrating the year 7 standard
PDF of this task and Illustrations of the year 5, 6 and 7 standards (1.35MB)