On January 22, students in Mr. Halter’s Algebra 2 were given the task of throwing a bean bag to create a parabola between the two corn-hole boards. Students brought corn-hole boards into the cafeteria to conduct this project.

Class of 2020 student Tommy French, said, “It was a refreshing change of pace and fun use of the algebra skills we learned.”

After recording the toss on a smartphone, students graphed the parabolas on a sheet of graph paper. They created a function to determine where the beanbag would land.

Class of 2020 member Joseph Hartung, said, “This activity was one of the most interesting ways to use math outside of the classroom.”

The student’s end of the year project involves creating their own corn-hole boards. Students must find the cost of materials from shops like Home Depot and Lowes, using trigonometry to find the angle of elevation for the board, and using Desmos to draw a design on the board that consists of at least 2 functions students have previously learned about.

Last year, one of Mr. Halter’s students took this project one step further and built an actual corn-hole board using the measurements he calculated on his project.

Mr.Halter asked his students to sign the board the student built as a way to say goodbye to his students leaving for the next semester.