Containers for Change WA - What’s in our Bin?

This lesson is designed to build students’ competencies in the following skills:

• critical thinking
• collaboration
• communication
• reflection

Western Australian Curriculum - Year 6, Mathematics

• Make connections between equivalent fractions, decimals and percentages (ACMNA131)
• Interpret and compare a range of data displays, including side-by-side column graphs for two categorical variables (ACMSP147)

Australian Curriculum (v9.0) content descriptions - Mathematics

• Students solve problems that require finding a familiar fraction, decimal or percentage of a quantity, including percentage discounts, choosing efficient calculation strategies and using digital tools where appropriate (AC9M6N07).
• Students plan and conduct statistical investigations by posing and refining questions or identifying a problem and collecting relevant data; analyse and interpret the data and communicate findings within the context of the investigation (AC9M6ST03).

General capabilities: Critical and Creative Thinking, Ethical Understanding, Numeracy

Cross-curriculum priority: Sustainability

Relevant parts of Year 6 achievement standards: Students solve problems involving finding a fraction, decimal or percentage of a quantity and use estimation to find approximate solutions to problems involving rational numbers and percentages. They compare distributions of discrete and continuous numerical and ordinal categorical data sets as part of their statistical investigations, using digital tools.

Western Australian Curriculum - Year 6, Mathematics

• Make connections between equivalent fractions, decimals and percentages (ACMNA131)
• Interpret and compare a range of data displays, including side-by-side column graphs for two categorical variables (ACMSP147)

UN SDG 11: Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable

• Target 11.6 By 2030, reduce the adverse per capita environmental impact of cities, including by paying special attention to air quality and municipal and other waste management.

• Contents of a bin
• Device to display videos
• Example percentages resource (for students who may require additional support)
• Gloves, tongs and tarp for sorting rubbish
• Butchers paper, tarp, ruler, protractor and marker
• Pie Chart Example 1 (for display to the class)
• Pie Chart Example 2 (one per student)
• Protractors and calculators (for extension activities)

Level of teacher scaffolding: High - direct instruction, leading of discussions, supervising waste sorting activity for safety considerations.