Kindergarten to Grade 3 Geometry and Spatial Sense

• build structures using three-dimensional figures. Students make relationshipsbetween the figures and the objects they represent (e.g., using a rectangularprism to represent a tower), and apply their understanding of physical attributesof the figures (e.g., knowing that a pyramid remains in position when placedon a rectangular prism).Instructional StrategiesStudents in Kindergarten benefit from the following instructional strategies:• providing opportunities to create pictures using two-dimensional shapes(e.g., paper cut-outs, stickers, stamps, pattern blocks). Students who makesimple pictures, in which each shape represents one object, benefit fromviewing and discussing pictures in which shapes are combined to representan object;• providing experiences in creating designs and patterns using two-dimensionalshapes (e.g., pattern blocks), and in discussing how the shapes are put together;• providing puzzles in which students cover an outline with shapes (e.g., patternblocks, tangram pieces, attribute blocks). Teachers can demonstrate how tochoose and place shapes to match the puzzle outlines and how shapes canbe turned or flipped to make them fit the puzzle;• discussing how smaller shapes have been put together to make larger shapes(e.g., smaller triangles to make a larger triangle) and how larger shapes havebeen taken apart to make smaller shapes;• having them respond to “What do you see?” activities. Teachers show a simpledesign (e.g., the shape shown below) for a few seconds and then ask studentsto describe or draw what they saw;• providing opportunities to build structures using materials (e.g., buildingblocks, construction sets) and to discuss the two-dimensional shapes andthree-dimensional figures in the structures.Geometric Relationships 33