This lesson will be an introduction to the many areas where math is utilized in an iron foundry.

The mathematical modeling process often begins with messy real-life problems that require students to formulate questions, make assumptions, and construct a mathematical model to describe a real world situation. Wisconsin Math Council is happy to launch our Wisconsin Modeling Challenges. Each challenge contains the context and a strategy to launch the modeling task so that students at any grade level can identify questions and make observations. Each challenge also contains specific grade level modeling tasks related to the context. WMC hopes that these challenges will engage your learners in experiences to become “flexible users of mathematics who see how mathematics can be used to understand their world and the world around them.”

The Context for Challenge 1: Meals on Wheels delivers approximately 221 million meals each year to 2.4 million seniors. Meals are delivered around lunch time by volunteers who also conduct wellness checks.

This lesson unit is intended to help you assess how well students are able to solve quadratics in one variable. In particular, the lesson will help you identify and help students who have the following difficulties:
Making sense of a real life situation and deciding on the math to apply to the problem.Solving quadratic equations by taking square roots, completing the square, using the quadratic formula, and factoring.Interpreting results in the context of a real life situation.

In this math lesson, students will be using math skills to determine the best layout of industrial parts to be cut from a sheet of metal. Students will then calculate both the cost of the materials used and the percentage and cost of waste remaining after cutting out the industrial parts.