Size Shuffle

Task

Materials

• One pair of "taller" and "shorter" cards for each student
  

Action

• The students stand in a circle with the cards in their hands.

• The teacher says "GO." The students find a partner and stand face-to-face. The taller student holds up the "taller" card and the shorter student holds up the "shorter" card.

• When the teacher calls out a student’s name, they respond in a complete sentence:

  I am shorter (taller) than __________.

  The teacher calls on three or four students each round.

The teacher says "GO" and calls on three or four different students each time until all the students have had a turn to respond.

IM Commentary

The purpose of this task is for students to understand and practice using comparison language for height. Kindergarten students will often use the words "littler" and "bigger" when they compare themselves, but this could be weight rather than height. When students use comparison language specific to the attribute being measured (such as shorter/taller) rather than more generic comparison language (such as smaller/bigger) they are engaging in MP6, Attend to precision.

Note that the words on the cards are written in two different colors; the colors help students who cannot yet read. Alternatively, the cards could have a picture below the words showing a short and a tall stick figure with the shorter (or taller) figure circled on the card that says "shorter" ("taller", respectively).

If there is concern that some students might feel self-conscious because they are taller or shorter than everyone else, then one option is to read the book It's Okay To Be Different by Todd Parr before doing this activity.

Solution

Students should become familiar with the words, “taller/shorter”, and that they refer to height.

Other possible variations are; having each student hold a number of items, different sizes of items or containers. The responses would then be: more/less, bigger/littler, hold more/hold less, or heavier/lighter.