Quadrilateral flowchart puzzle

The Quadrilateral Flowchart Puzzle is designed to help students overcome the confusion that can arise when they learn that a square is also a rectangle—and a rhombus and a parallelogram and a kite and a trapezium.

Students cut out eight arrows, each labelled with a quadrilateral property, and seven different quadrilaterals.

The activity begins with a quadrilateral with no special properties. If that quadrilateral is then found to have one pair of parallel sides, the quadrilateral can now be called a trapezium. This is indicated by connecting the quadrilateral to the trapezium with one of the coloured arrows labelled 'one pair of parallel sides'. In the finished flowchart, the quadrilateral is at the top and the square is at the bottom, because the square has the greatest number of properties.

It may be helpful for students to have an idea of what the finished product will look like.