1. Teacher Guide
This lesson is designed to teach kids to ask a critical thinking question that you can’t just put into a search box to solve. To do that, we encourage them with smaller questions that search can help them answer. Make sure that you read the notes for each slide: they not only give you teaching tips but also provide answers and hints so you can help the kids if they are having trouble.
Remember, you can always send feedback to the Bing in the Classroom team at You can learn more about the program at bing.com/classroom and follow the daily lessons on our Partners In Learning site.
Want to extend today’s lesson? Consider using Skype in the Classroom to arrange for your class to chat with another class in today’s location. And if you are using Windows 8, you can also use the Bing apps to learn more about this location and topic; the Travel and News apps in particular make great teaching tools.
Alice Keeler is a mother of 5 and a teacher in Fresno, California. She has her B.A in Mathematics, M.S. in Educational Media Design and Technology and is currently working on a doctorate in Educational Technology with an emphasis in games and simulations. EdTech speaker, blogger, and presenter. Founder of coffeeEDU, a 1 hour conference event for educators. New Media Consortium Horizon report advisory panel member. High school math teacher for 14 years. Currently teaching pre-service teachers curriculum, instruction and technology at California State University Fresno. Teaches online for Fresno Pacific University in the Masters in Educational Technology. Passionate that kids are not failures, researches gamification in education to increase student motivation.
This lesson is designed to teach the Common Core State Standard: Mathematics
CCSS.MATH.PRACTICE.MP4 Model with mathematics.
CCSS.MATH.PRACTICE.MP5 Use appropriate tools strategically.

2. Can you create a shape that is constantly similar to itself?
© NASA/USGS
Having this up as kids come in is a great settle down activity. You can start class by asking them for thoughts about the picture or about ideas on how they could solve the question of the day.

3. Can you create a shape that is constantly similar to itself?
In Māori mythology, Taranaki once lived in the central part of New Zealand’s North Island, along with all the other mountains. But a fight between the peaks erupted, and a wounded Taranaki retreated to the southwest shore of North Island, where it stands today.
That’s far more colorful than the geological history of this young volcano. It’s been erupting, collapsing, and building itself up again for just 135,000 years—practically the blink of an eye in geologic terms. Taranaki’s most recent activity was the collapse of a lava dome that slid down the mountainside in the mid-1800s.
That dark circle around the snowy peak is protected forest known as Egmont National Park. Egmont was the name Captain Cook gave Taranaki when he landed here in Today it’s known by either name, though most modern maps use the Māori form, Taranaki.
Depending on time, you can either have students read this silently to themselves, have one of them read out loud, or read it out loud yourself.

4. Can you create a shape that is constantly similar to itself?1
Image Search
Use Bing Images to locate examples of Mandelbrot sets. Describe what Mandelbrot sets are from the images. 2
Web Search
Define fractals. 3
Conduct a Bing Search for Sierpinski Triangles. Describe what they look like. 4
Office 365
Use drawing tools in a PowerPoint slide to create a Sierpinski Triangle of 3 iterations. 5
How can fractals be used to draw nature?
There are a couple of ways to use this slide, depending on how much technology you have in your classroom. You can have students find answers on their own, divide them into teams to have them do all the questions competitively, or have each team find the answer to a different question and then come back together. If you’re doing teams, it is often wise to assign them roles (one person typing, one person who is in charge of sharing back the answer, etc.)

5. Can you create a shape that is constantly similar to itself?5
Minutes
You can adjust this based on how much time you want to give kids. If a group isn’t able to answer in 5 minutes, you can give them the opportunity to update at the end of class or extend time.

6. Can you create a shape that is constantly similar to itself?1
Image Search
Use Bing Images to locate examples of Mandelbrot sets. Describe what Mandelbrot sets are from the images. 2
Web Search
Define fractals. 3
Conduct a Bing Search for Sierpinski Triangles. Describe what they look like. 4
Office 365
Use drawing tools in a PowerPoint slide to create a Sierpinski Triangle of 3 iterations. 5
How can fractals be used to draw nature?
You can ask the students verbally or let one of them come up and insert the answer or show how they got it. This way, you also have a record that you can keep as a class and share with parents, others.

7. Can you create a shape that is constantly similar to itself?1
Image Search
Use Bing Images to locate examples of Mandelbrot sets. Describe what Mandelbrot sets are from the images.
(Possible Search Queries: Mandelbrot sets, Mandelbrot sets nature)
Sources
Mandelbrot sets appear to be the same shape repeated but it keeps getting smaller.

8. Can you create a shape that is constantly similar to itself?2
Web Search
Define fractals.
(Possible Search Queries: define:fractals )
fractal
[ ˈfraktəl ]
NOUN
a curve or geometric figure, each part of which has the same statistical character as the whole. Fractals are useful in modeling structures (such as eroded coastlines or snowflakes) in which similar patterns recur at progressively smaller scales, and in describing partly random or chaotic phenomena such as crystal growth, fluid turbulence, and galaxy formation.

9. Can you create a shape that is constantly similar to itself?3
Web Search
Conduct a Bing Search for Sierpinski Triangles. Describe what they look like.
(Possible Search Queries: Sierpinski Triangles)
Sources
Wikipedia:
Sierpinski triangles is a form of a fractal that has an attractive design. The shape is an equilateral triangle and it is divided up in to smaller equilateral triangles.

10. Can you create a shape that is constantly similar to itself?4
Office 365
Use drawing tools in a PowerPoint slide to create a Sierpinski Triangle of 3 iterations.
Students will want to hold down the shift key when they create their triangles in order to create a equilateral triangle. Students should hold down the shift key when rotating the triangles to rotate in 5˚ increments.

11. Can you create a shape that is constantly similar to itself?5
Web Search
How can fractals be used to draw nature?
(Possible Search Queries: fractals draw nature, nature fractals draw, fractals in nature, fractals draw nature fern)
Sources
Pinintrist:
Fractals Useful Beauty:
The nature of code:
You can draw things in nature by breaking down the natures shape into a small component and then grow from that. For example ferns.

12. Can you create a shape that is constantly similar to itself?
This slide is a chance to summarize the information from the previous slides to build your final answer to the question.