Area & Perimeter

Objectives

To be able to identify the difference between area and perimeter and to devise strategies for working them out.

Resources

Abacus 4 Textbook 3 | Scanner or copier | Area (MyMaths)

Today's Lesson

Main Activity

Talk about area and perimeter with your student.

Area is the amount of space taken up by a shape or object or how much surface it covers. It is measured in squares of the units involved, for example, squared centimetres. This is expressed as cm².

Perimeter is the outside measurement of the shape, or the distance all the way around the outside. Perimeters are measured in whichever unit of measurement is involved, for example, metres (m) or centimetres (cm).

Turn to page 31 in Abacus 4 Textbook 3.

Look at the shapes drawn on the page and ask your student how they think they could find the area of the shapes.

This could be done by counting the number of squares the shape takes up. This is the method that we will use for this lesson, to ensure that the concept is completely understood.

Watch the video 'Area'.

Scan or copy the page, so your student can write directly on the paper.

Remind your student that it is extremely important to represent the answer using the correct unit of measurement, for example, 12 cm².

Run through activities 5 and 6 on Area (MyMaths)

Remind your student of the method of finding the perimeter of a rectangle by either adding the measurements of all four sides together, or by multiplying each length by 2 and adding the answers together.

The unit of measure is metres (m) on this page. Ask your student to complete the calculations on the page.

Extra Activities

You might like to try the homework activity on the My Portal section of MyMaths to practise this skill further.

MyMaths Homework - Introducing area

Citations

[1] app.mymaths.co.uk [2] app.mymaths.co.uk