Student Projects: Basic Ideas

Links are given here to presentations developed by students at Oklahoma State University as projects for the course MATH 3403 -- Geometric Structures. Students were asked to develop a presentation which expresses the way in which they make sense of the topic. Topics chosen are among those which students often find confusing or difficult.

We hope you enjoy browsing through these presentations. These presentations are intended to be a benefit for future students as they, in their turn, also struggle to make sense of these ideas from geometry.

Most of the students developing these presentations intend to be elementary school teachers. For this reason down-to-earth, direct explanations are preferred. If a fourth grader will understand the presentation, then many college students might understand as well.

Parts of a Triangle:

The Construction of the Circumcenter, Incenter, and Balance Point by Alicia Divelbiss
Balancing the Pizza by Gwen Fholer

Concave or Convex:

The Crawl Test by Aaron Taylor
Concave or Convex by Jennifer Kahle

More General or Special Case:

Why is a Square also a Rectangle by Bonnie Yoder
Why is a Parallelogram More General that a Square, Rectangle and a Rhombus by Courtney Griffiths

Definitions and Properties:

Definitions and Properties. An example project highlighting the differences between definitions and properties, by Lindsey Lewis. (PDF file - 1.6MB)
To Me a Kite is.... Samples of Student Work on a project (PDF file - 369K )
To Me a Kite is.... by Christine Ramey (PDF file - 145K )

Diagonals of Quadrilaterals:

Diagonals of Quadrilaterals -- Perpendicular, Bisecting or Both by Jennifer Kahle

Constructions:

Constructing an Isosceles Right Triangle with given Hypotenuse by Lana Olivo