As the best roommate ever, I often help Chantal grade her 5th and 6th grade students' papers. For the record, I'm all about efficiency and saving the underpaid teacher's time--I say, have the kids exchange papers and help you grade them immediately following the exam. Any 10-11 year old smart enough to try to get a potential tattle-tale classmate to collude with them in favor of a higher grade deserves a good grade anyway. But, I digress. Back to the subject at hand.A couple of days ago, I mistakenly took up Chantal's challenge to take the 5th grade "Quadrilateral Quiz" she was writing. I like to think I'm pretty good at math, having suffered through a calculus-based Econ major. However, my ego suffered a major blow as Chantal refused to tell me exactly what a "rhombus" was before I took the quiz. My mistaken assumptions proved fatal as I answered the following questions:
True of False:
1._____ A rhombus is always a parallelogram.
2._____ A square is always a rhombus.
3._____ A trapezoid has two pairs of parallel sides.
4._____ A rectangle is sometimes a square.
5._____ A rhombus has four ninety degree angles.
What am I?
6. I have two pairs of parallel sides that are all the same length. I have at least one right angle. What am I? _________________________________
7. I have one pair of parallel sides. I have two acute and two obtuse angles. What am I? ____________________________________
8. I have two pairs of parallel sides. My sides are not all the same length. I have no right angles. What am I? _____________________________________
9. I am always a parallelogram. All my sides are the same length and I have no right angles. What am I? ___________________________________
Short Answer
10. What is the sum of all the angles in a quadrilateral? _______________________
Needless to say, I... ahem... failed. Further, my (logically flawless) argument to Chantal that I had not recently reviewed the subject matter fell on deaf ears.
The following day, Chantal reported my score to her math class, and told them that if they could beat my score, they were smarter than an attorney. To add insult to injury, she then handed the test out to all her fellow math teachers and relayed that same message to them. I am glad all of Westridge Elementary knows that I am a doofus who failed a fifth grade math quiz.
Yes, that's right. I have been exploited. I wonder if I could sue...
6 comments:
Hmm. Is this the best logical thought path to be teaching our little ones? Power to the attorneys who had to clear the rhombus info out of their heads to study for the bar exam (and who might have lost some key social skills at the same time).
answers???
Per Webster's:
rhom·bus Pronunciation[rom-buhs]
noun
a parallelogram with four equal sides; an oblique-angled equilateral parallelogram
Yes, I would not have known this either and I have a BA in accounting. How sad is that?
That's awesome~and definitely great motivation for a 5th grader to do well on a quiz!
awesome. Just awesome. I would fail as well... This is actually one of my paranoias about having kids- the day they ask me to help w/ Math and i'll give a blank stare!
Here you go, Shiloh:
1. T 2. T 3. F 4. T 5. F 6. square 7. trapezoid 8. parallelogram 9. rhombus 10. 360 degrees
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