Relay Race Math Challenge

Ask your child to decorate the baton. Cut tin foil or wrapping paper and wrap it around the hollow paper towel roll and tape in place. Decorate with stickers, pom poms, or colorful tinsel paper.

Explain to your child that you are going to create a bar graph to help keep track of the results of the relay race. You can draw the bar graph on a piece of paper or on cement using chalk. Along the horizontal line, write the name of each relay team member. Along the vertical line, write time increments by minutes (1 minute, 2 minutes, 3 minutes, etc.).

Whether on a track, open field, or sidewalk, mark your race track. Draw start lines for each racer in the relay and designate a parent or older sibling as the timekeeper.

Take your marks. Ready, set, GO! Remember to pass off the baton to the next runner on your team. Try not to drop the baton!

Record your times on your graph using chalk to draw bars over the team names.

Review the findings on your bar graph with your child. You can ask your child:

• "What does the bar graph show?"
• "How can the bar graph tell us who won the race?"
• "Who was the fastest runner and what was their time?"
• "Who was the slowest runner and what was their time?"
• "Does a smaller time mean a faster time?"
• "Does a bigger time mean a slower time?"
• "How much faster would the slowest runner need to improve to beat the fastest runner's time?"