Building with 3-D Shapes
Compose three-dimensional shapes (cubes, right rectangular prisms, right circular cones, right circular cylinders) and create composite shapes; build new shapes from component shapes, including structures whose two halves match
Lesson
Set out your lesson
Build a composite solid and name its parts.
Before teaching
Can discuss the supplied example in an accessible mode; adapt directions without supplying the target answer.
Check the learner can follow the model with support before moving on. Source prerequisite ordering is not learner mastery; return to prerequisite work when needed.
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Teaching approaches
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1 approach
Build a composite solid and name its parts.
Build a composite solid and name its parts.
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Learning resources
Extra practice links — they do not replace Gakuva’s teaching approach.
Illustrative Mathematics · Practice link — not the full lesson
Box of Clay
Before you open · source notes
A clay box story supports building with 3-D amounts and volume ideas. Not every 2-D perimeter drill.
Free, no sign-in. A teacher solution is on the same page, so use the student view with your child.
Before you openAsk the learner to explain how the clay fills the box using length, width, and height.
Opening this link does not save learning or assess mastery.
Source, access and review notes
Public Illustrative Mathematics task page. The .html address responds HTTP 308 to this URL. An anonymous GET of this URL on 2026-11-12 returned HTTP 200 with no login or payment prompt. Where a teacher solution is present, it is on the same page as the student task; this check did not find a separate locked student view. An adult can use the student view section and should not read a solution aloud. Advertising was not observed in the fetched HTML text; that is not a browser, device, or ad-free guarantee. This is a paper or discussion task, not an automatically marked interactive game. Opening the link does not save practice or assess mastery. Diagrams on the page use missing or filename-only alt text, so they are not an accessible image equivalent. Accessibility still depends on an adult describing the picture.
Illustrative Mathematics. “Box of Clay.” Licensed CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. External task; Gakuva does not copy, host, embed, or redistribute it.
CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 — link only
Check understanding
- Stack cubes and prisms, or combine 3-D shapes (e.g. a cone on top of a cylinder), to build towers, structures and new solids
- Describe a composite 3-D shape in terms of its component shapes
- Build a structure whose two halves match and show where it divides into the matching halves
“Can your child combine 3-D shapes — like stacking cubes and cylinders — to build a new composite solid?”
Curriculum record
- Type
- Procedural
- Subject
- Mathematics
- Domain
- Geometry
- Age range
- Ages 6–10
Standards