Plan your space

A plan view is like slicin g the top off a room and looking down to cre ate a map of whats th ere.

Before you can design and build a new treetop bedroom, you need to size up your current room. Here you can try your hand at plan and scale drawings to record even the smallest details of your personal space. Once youve done the maths and measuring in this section, you will have an outline that will help you get really creative in the next activity.

We used a foot to measure the distance between the wall and the door. 13.5 X my foot

We used an outstretched arm to measure the length of the wall between the corner and the door

1x my arm

Imagine you are looking at your house from above. Now picture how it might look if you sliced off the roof. What you would see is called a plan view. Take a look at the example and think about how your bedroom might look from this angle. Consider each detail that you should include to make the drawing as accurate as possible for example where your bed is and any sections of the wall that may stick out.

Instructions
Step 1
Take a blank piece of A4 paper and write your name on it. Draw your plan in pencil, then use a thick pen for the walls. This willhelp to show the windows and doorsand give a clearer outline. Look carefully at the detail: Do you have a fitted wardrobe? n Where is your computer? n Where do you keep your magazines? n How far is the window from the bed?
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Step 2
You can use your arm or foot to measure your room, as shown in the example. Sketchyour armand foot next to your plan and label them,then get measuring. Start with the big stuff, such as the walls, door and windows. Make a note of how many arms or feet it took to measure these. You can include half or quarter measurements. It took 13.5 feet to measure the length of the room in the example. Back in class your teacher will show you how to turn this sketch plan into a scale drawing.
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Did you know?

Before we measured lengths in centimetres and metres (the metric system), people used a measurement system based on the body called the imperial system. We still use this, for example, when we say someone is six feet tall. The body as a unit of measure goes back thousands of years and was even used by the Roman Empire and the Ancient Egyptians.

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