Look at these two shapes. The first is the shape of a red stop sign at the side of a road. The second is the shape of one cell in a piece of honeycomb from a beehive.
How many straight sides can you count on the stop sign? Does every side look the same length?
Now the honeycomb cell: how many straight sides does one cell have?
One board, three shapes. Tap a name and that shape appears, then its sides light up and get numbered one by one all the way round. Count along with the numbers.
A pentagon has five sides. A hexagon has six. An octagon has eight.
Watch how the last number round the shape is always its side count.
In your maths copy, draw a pentagon, a hexagon and an octagon, side by side. Use a ruler for every straight side.
Challenge: when we look at the shapes on the board together, add how many pairs of parallel sides and how many lines of symmetry each one has.
We count four shapes together on the board, one after another, ending with a shape turned onto its side.
As the board numbers the sides of each shape one by one, the whole class counts out loud together. When the count is done, we all say the shape's name.
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