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X Marks the Spot

How can we employ mathematics to code and communicate an exact location?

A screenshot from Google maps with a red navigation marker on a specific location.

Creative Artifact

Students team up to create an epic mathematical scavenger hunt for their classmates, crafting challenges that put their skills in writing, graphing, and solving linear equations and inequalities to the test. It’s a game of brains and teamwork where math comes alive in every clue!

Written Commentary

Each clue in the scavenger hunt focuses on a specific mathematical concept from the unit. In addition to crafting a set of clues, students will submit a completed “answer key” to the scavenger hunt their group created. They will also share the math work their group completed in order to determine the location of the next clue when completing the scavenger hunt created by another group.

Exhibition

Student groups trade scavenger hunts and use the clues the other group has created to seek out the hidden treasure.

Implementation Notes

Credit Eligibility

  • nth root symbol

    Math

Prerequisites Needed

Pre-Algebra

Modular Suggestions

A unit within an Algebra 1 course – could be used as an application-based unit alongside a more traditional unit on linear equations or as a full linear equations replacement unit.

TLE-Based Semester/Full-Year Course Suggestions

Algebra 1:
X Marks the Spot,
The Hustle Economy,
College Cents,
The Cost of Debt

Standards Addressed

  • HSA-CED.A.1: Create equations and inequalities in one variable and use them to solve problems.
  • HSA-CED.A.2: Create equations in two variables to represent relationships between quantities; graph equations on coordinate axes with labels and scales.
  • HSA-CED.A.3: Represent constraints by linear equations or inequalities, and by systems of linear equations and/or inequalities, and interpret solutions as viable or non-viable options in a modeling context.
  • HSA.REI.A.1: Explain each step in solving a simple equation as following from the equality of numbers asserted at the previous step, starting from the assumption that the original equation has a solution. Construct a viable argument to justify a solution method.
  • HS.A.REI.B.3: Solve linear equations and inequalities in one variable, including equations with coefficients represented by letters.
  • HS.A-REI.C.6: Solve linear equations exactly and approximately (e.g., with graphs), focusing on pairs of linear equations in two variables.*
  • HS.A-REI.D.10: Understand that the graph of an equation in two variables is the set of all its solutions plotted in the coordinate plane, often forming a curve (which could be a line).
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