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Popcorn cylinders in Year 8 ELMS

  • 12 Oct 2016
Year 8 ELMs spent a week investigating the topic of measurement through different activities. On Monday the 10th of October, the class set out to discover which dimension of a cylinder had a greater impact on the volume; the radius or the height.

We made two cylinders using the same sized sheet of paper which resulted in a tall thin cylinder and a short wide cylinder. Initially, we all predicted the cylinders would have the same volume, given that the curved surfaces have the same area. Throughout the experiment and after some more thinking, some of us starting changing our mind about the cylinders having the same volume, so we were quite eager to see the results. Using popcorn to compare the volumes we discovered that the shorter cylinder actually had a greater volume.

For some, the best part of the lesson was eating the leftover popcorn while completing the worksheet to prove our results using mathematics. This definitely left us on a sugar high for a few hours of the day.

Lauren Mauger

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