Super Storm Sandy Task

Group accountability: Each group must develop a solution to the problem and communicate it orally. Individual accountability: Each individual must have his/her written solution and be prepared to justify the solution if chosen randomly. Task: On October 30, 2012 Super Storm Sandy hit Cape May, New Jersey. The storm washed sand from the beach to nearby homes to a height of 6 ft. Consider the dimensions of the vacation home and lot, which is a small area of land. If a dumpster can only be filled to a height of 3 feet, how many dumpsters are needed to clear the sand away from the lot? 1. Before you begin, guess how many dumpsters are needed to clear away the sand. Write your guess here.

2. Complete the task and justify your solution.

3. How does your solution compare to your guess? Describe what you learned, or what was confirmed.

Super Storm Sandy

The dimensions of the lot, which is small area of land, are 100ft x 75ft. The dimensions of the vacation home are shown below.
25 ft.

75 ft.

50 ft.

The sand washed up to the home to a height of 6 ft.

The dumpster can only be filled to 3 feet.

25 ft.

Vacation home

Resource card #1
Did you consider the height of the sand?

Resource Card #2
Is sand in the house?

Resource Card #3
Think about how much sand would fill a recycle bin. Then relate this to how much sand would fill the dumpster.

Extension #1
This front end loader will be used to remove the sand.

If the buckets capacity is 108 cubic feet, how many buckets will it take to remove the sand from the lot?

Extension #2
Instead of using a dumpster, the homeowner has decided to use a dump truck. As demonstrated in the pictures below, it takes 50 seconds for a front end loader to drive sand into a bucket, dump it into a dump truck, then return the bucket to its starting position. Assume the dump truck holds 324 cubic feet of sand and it takes 20 minutes for the truck to dump the sand off site and return to the property. How long will it take to remove all the sand? Compare using a dumpster with using a dump truck. Which strategy would you use and why? Include any mathematical and/or other information that may not have been presented in the task.