Watch the shape on the screen. It has moved three squares across to a new spot. Look at it where it started and where it finished.
Tell me in your own words what you saw the shape do.
Show the shape before and after, and take two or three hands-up answers in the pupils' own words.
Do not name the word slide yet, and do not offer turn or flip either. Let pupils describe what they see first, then you name it in the next step.
The shape is a corner shape rather than a square on purpose: a square looks the same whichever way you turn it, so on a square a slide and a turn are impossible to tell apart.
When a shape slides, it moves to a new place but keeps facing the same way. It does not turn and it does not flip. That is the whole test for a slide: if the shape still faces exactly the same way, it slid.
Each picture below shows a shape before and after a slide. Every corner has moved the same number of squares in the same direction.
A shape can slide in any direction, not only right and down. The third picture below shows a shape that has slid to the left.
The fourth picture below shows a shape that has slid up.
In the last picture the shape has slid two ways at once. See where each corner has ended up.
Point to one corner in each picture and ask the class to find where that one corner has landed. Revoice: so every corner moved the same, and the shape is still pointing the same way.
On the left and up examples, stress that a slide works in every direction, not just right and down — pupils will need all four directions shortly.
Head off the common slip: pupils confuse a slide with a turn. Ask on the second example whether the triangle has spun at all — it has not.
Now we slide the shape together on the board. Each turn moves the shape on from wherever it is now — a slide just pushes it that many squares in that direction. Take turns:
The interactive stays in explore mode and does not reset between turns, so the shape starts each slide from wherever the last pupil left it. That is fine: a slide is a relative push, so every prompt is unambiguous no matter where the shape currently sits. Name one slide at a time, then have an individual pupil drag the shape that many squares from its current spot. Before a pupil lets go, ask the class to predict where one named corner will land. Keep it brisk — rotate four pupils. Watch for pupils who accidentally rotate the shape while dragging; the readout will show it faces the same way when done correctly.
The third and fourth prompts rehearse left and up, which the class just saw in Watch and Notice. For the fourth prompt, slide it 3 squares up, ask the class to picture the shape rising three squares from where it currently is before the pupil drags, so an upward slide is not new when they meet it in the challenge.
In your maths copy on squared paper, draw a small shape. Then draw it again after a slide of 4 squares to the right.
Check carefully: your new shape must face exactly the same way as the first one.
Walk the room and glance that each pupil's second shape faces the same way and every corner has moved 4 squares — no marking, this is whole-class copybook practice.
Now we slide shapes to hit a target outline on the grid. Take turns:
This is the practice round — pupils take turns at the board, check each answer, and the class confirms before moving on. Keep the board work brisk rather than over-explaining.
For each target, have a pupil slide the shape to match the dashed outline, then press Check. Ask the class to say the slide out loud first ("how many across, how many up or down?"). The last one slides up — the class met an upward slide in Watch and Notice and rehearsed one in Try It Together, so ask them to picture it going up before they drag.
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