7th grade Absolute Value: Deep Sea Rescue!!

6th Grade, 7th grade, All Lessons, Minecraft Lessons by grade level, Operations with Rational Numbers

Learning Target: Students will be able to evaluate absolute value in real-world situations

Task: Students will calculate the absolute value of objects from each other in the virtual lesson

Lesson Setting:

Part 1; students are part of a rescue effort to retrieve a group of scientists trapped at the bottom of the ocean. Students are to travel to submarines, talking with NPCs to gather vital information about the distance from submarines to the surface to the bottom of the ocean. The calculate which vessel can successfully conduct a rescue operation.

Rescue platorm
Does the Rescue Sub have enough resources to make the rescue attempt?
NPC on the Sub
Calculating distance with absolute value
The submarine students boarded to engage with the sub crew
Talking with the scientist in the underwater observatory

 

 

Part 2; students assist a motorist on the side of the road, determining if the driver can drive back to the harbor and then the gas station to get gas.

Help the motorist on the side of the road
Using absolute value to calculate distance.
Speaking with an NPC to gather the last piece of information.

Materials: Students were given a worksheet to write answers and show their work. Students also required a laptop with which to work on.

Time: Students had 40 minutes to complete the task. This could easily have been a 90-minute task, or even a two-day task.

Setup: Set in “immutable world”, “creative mode,” and unable to equip any items

What went well:

  1. The storyboard approach promoted student engagement; students spoke with various NPC’s to understand the situation
  2. the situations presented accurately addressed absolute value
  3. When students were in the water, vision is limited; one of the students asked me to grant everyone water breathing, which improved underwater vision.

What could have gone better

  1. Students understood what absolute value was; however, they struggled when applied to real-world situations. The students should have been exposed to more real-world absolute value problems before doing this activity
  2. The rescue sub needed to be remade, as the students could not identify it.
  3. While the setting was excellent, Students did not get past the first section. It was too long.