Today, Esteban’s math script introduced geoboards. Mind you, as a second grader, this is the third year he’s worked with geoboards, so I skipped over the script.

But we got into some new territory, like the mathematical term for a corner in a shape–an angle.

It went something like this:

“Blah, blah, blah, mathematicians call corners in shapes angles. How many angles are in a triangle?”

“3.”

“Hence the name, triangle.”

The children are giggling.

“Does rectangle mean four angles?”

“I’m not sure about that. I’ll have to look that up. But what about a square? Or a trapezoid, or a rhombus…or a parallelogram? How many sides do all these shapes have?”

“4.”
Esteban stretches a ‘geoband’ (sturdy, colorful rubber band) on his board into the shape of a square.

“How do you know it’s a square?” I ask.

“Because it looks like one.”

“What makes it look like a square?”

Imani and Joy know the answer. They are bursting at the seams.

I make a rectangle on the geoboard. “How are rectangles and squares different?”

“Their sides are longer.”

I change the rectangle so that the sides are narrower but taller.

“What makes a rectangle different from a square?”

Esteban tries to gesture shapes with his fingers. “Use words,” I tell him.

I make a trapezoid. “How is the trapezoid different from the square?”

“The sides are different.”

“How? How do you know a rectangle and a square?”

“Because 2 of the sides of the rectangle are the same, and the square has all 4 sides the same.”

The room let out a collective sigh.