Problem Solving Article: Hot Wheels

In the article "Hot Wheels" from Mathematics Teaching in the Middle School, an activity involving hot wheels cars is described. The students in the classroom are given a hot wheels car and they are told the scale between a hot wheels car and real car is 1:64. They are then told to figure out the dimensions of the real car based on their hot wheels. Students are not told exactly how to do this so they must use problem solving in order to complete the task. After doing this the students can see that the scale is not completely accurate because the dimensions on the real car are nothing close to an actual real car. So, the students must try to figure out why their dimensions do not match up to those of a real car. Meanwhile, the teacher is providing all the questioning for these students to guide them to the solution.

Postive things of this article and activity are clearly seen when you compare it to the process standard problem solving from Principles and Standards. Problem solving should incorporate multiple topics and this activity does that. It covers similiar figures and proportional reasoning. The activity also shows the real life application of mathematics. Most students would never think they could use math with hot wheels cars, but after doing this activity they can see that and start to wonder what else they can apply math to.

In this article the students did not have all of the knowledge necessary to complete the activity. They knew how to measure things but through the activity they also learned about proportions. That is a key concept in problem solving, that the students can continue to build their knowledge through problem solving. The students were able to reflect on this activity and understand how they could use mathematics to find the size of a real car from their hot wheels car. By allowing them to reflect the teacher helped the students to recognize even more about mathematics.