Vocabulary Review "Cootie Catcher"

In my Honors Geometry class we are currently studying polygons and quadrilaterals.  One of the things that my students have trouble with is remembering the properties of special quadrilaterals.  In order to solve a higher-level problem, students need to remember such facts as:

• The diagonals of a parallelogram bisect each other
• The diagonals of a rhombus are perpendicular
• The non-vertex angles of a kite are congruent

They have trouble keeping these properties straight.  I've tried using "cute" little ways to get my students to remember things, such as "if a rhombus and a rectangle got together and had a baby, they would call it a square", but I haven't notice a significant increase in recall.

This year I created some "cootie catchers" or "fortune tellers" to help my student review the different shape properties.  I put the different shape characteristics on the flaps and had the different quadrilaterals that shared the characteristics on the inside.

I copied the cootie catcher template and cut it out for my students.  I then instructed the students for the proper folding techniques.

Students used their "cootie catchers" together as a different way to review vocabulary.  They quizzed each other on the different shape properties and tried to see if they could name all of the quadrilaterals that fit the category.

Overall, students seemed to enjoy this new way of reviewing vocabulary.  Time will tell if this vocabulary review activity will help on the summative assessment.