Mathematics

Intermediate

50 mins

Teacher/Student led

Learning Goals

Learning Outcomes

Lesson Files

+80 XP

What you need:
IWB/Projector/Large Screen

Chance: Certain, Possible and Impossible

Explore the language of chance by sorting everyday events as certain, possible or impossible. Discover the crucial difference between an impossible event and a very unlikely one.

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1 Getting Started
2 Watch and Notice
3 Write Your Three Events in Your Copy
4 Try It Together
5 Class Challenge
6 What Did We Notice?
7 What's Next
Pupil practice

1 - Getting Started ~4 mins

Here are three questions. For each one, hands up: is it sure to happen, might it happen, or can it never happen?

Will the sun set this evening?
Could it rain at lunchtime today?
Will Monday come straight after Friday?

👇 Mark your steps as done as you complete them.

+5 XP

2 - Watch and Notice ~9 mins

Watch two spinners on the board. On the first, every part is the same colour. On the second, there are two colours. Notice which outcomes are sure, which are never going to happen, and which ones only might happen.

👇 Mark your steps as done as you complete them.

+10 XP

3 - Write Your Three Events in Your Copy ~3 mins

COPYBOOK MOMENT

In your maths copy, write three headings: certain, possible and impossible. Under each heading, write one everyday event of your own that fits it.

+10 XP

4 - Try It Together ~8 mins

Key point

Before each pupil changes the spinner, the rest of us decide in our heads what it should look like, then hands up to agree or change it. Each time, we say out loud why it fits the word before we check.

Today we set up the spinner three ways. First, make landing on red certain. Then make landing on red impossible. Then make it only possible — where red might turn up but might not.

Set up the spinner three ways

+15 XP

5 - Class Challenge ~9 mins

We sort these four event cards into three groups: certain, possible and impossible. We take them in this order, each one a little trickier than the last:

the next day of the week has a name
you roll a 4 on a dice
a pig flies to school on its own
it snows in Cork in July

Key point

For the last one, we decide together: is it truly impossible, or just very unlikely?

Hands-on Task

+15 XP

Pupil practice

Module 9 · Data and Chance Data & Chance

Lesson 111 · Chance: Certain, Possible and Impossible

Download Activity Book page (PDF)

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