Freshmen build playground models to learn math concepts

Freshman University of Houston-Victoria students Thalia Lozada, left, Emily Valtierra, Araceli Ramirez Garcia, Samantha Cortez, Hannah Konvicka and Kendall Rodriguez show their playground models Monday after their projects won a campuswide People’s Choice vote on Friday. The first-place model was made by Garcia of Victoria and Cortez of Houston, and the second-place project was by Lozada of Victoria and Valtierra of Rosenberg. Konvicka of Katy and Rodriguez of Leander received third place. The projects were part of the students’ “Freshman Seminar: Math Satellite” course and taught the students about size proportions and budgeting. In addition to building the models, the students had to put together an annotated bibliography of articles that examined the benefit of physical activity for children and write a report about the math concepts used in the models.

The University of Houston-Victoria, located in the heart of the Coastal Bend region since 1973 in Victoria, Texas, offers courses leading to more than 80 academic programs in the schools of Arts & Sciences; Business Administration; and Education, Health Professions & Human Development. UHV provides face-to-face classes at its Victoria campus, as well as an instructional site in Katy, Texas, and online classes that students can take from anywhere. UHV supports the American Association of State Colleges and Universities Opportunities for All initiative to increase awareness about state colleges and universities and the important role they have in providing a high-quality and accessible education to an increasingly diverse student population, as well as contributing to regional and state economic development.