Yesterday half of my Geometry students were out taking English 10 ECA's, and I thought it was the perfect opportunity to do some fun math things in class that I don't normally get to do. I chose to do a lesson on the Platonic solids from
NCTM Illuminations, since we had just finished studying surface area and volume of solids. And I wanted to play the game
Brussels Sprouts with them. I planned this out a few days ago, and the night before I looked over the rules of Brussels Sprouts and the math behind it. Lo and behold, Brussels Sprouts relies on the Euler characteristic that we were going to study when we explored the Platonic solids. I was blown away!
There is a special relationship between the number of faces, vertices, and edges of Platonic solids called the Euler characteristic: #f + #e - #v = 2. The NCTM applet lets students come up with that relationship on their own. That same relationship is what allows you to always win at Brussels Sprouts if you know the trick. Watch the video to find out how!
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| Game of Brussels Sprouts |
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| Euler Characteristic |
