Worksheet Grade 5 Art & Music
Planning a Watershed Mural on a Coordinate Grid
A grade 5 art and math worksheet where students plot mural features on a coordinate grid and read the coordinates to place a watershed scene.
Objectives
- Students will plot points in the first quadrant to place features of a mural.
- Students will read a point on the grid and name its coordinates.
- Students will count grid squares to find a length and an area on the mural plan.
Vocabulary
- Watershed
- A watershed is all the land where rain that falls will drain to the same stream, river, or lake. Everyone lives in a watershed, no matter how far from the water they live.
Also: coordinate, grid, origin
Teacher overview
A class is going to paint a watershed mural. A watershed is the land where rain drains down to one lake or river. To share the work, the class first plans the mural on a coordinate grid so every painter knows where each feature goes. This worksheet uses that plan. Students plot points, read points, and count squares to place the hills, the river, the lake, and the town on the wall.
Student Worksheet
On grid paper, draw a mural grid that is 10 squares wide and 10 squares tall, and use it for every item. The corner at the bottom left is the origin, the point (0, 0). The first number in a pair tells how many squares to go right. The second number tells how many squares to go up. Each square stands for 1 foot of wall.
Plot and label the mountain peak at the point (2, 9).
Plot and label the lake at the point (6, 3).
Plot and label the town at the point (9, 2).
Plot and label the sun at the point (8, 9).
A partner drew a raincloud 1 square right and 10 squares up from the origin. Write the raincloud's coordinates as a pair of numbers.
Look at the town point you plotted in item 3. Write how many squares right and how many squares up the town is from the origin.
The river is a straight up-and-down line. It starts at (3, 8) and ends at (3, 4). Count the squares between the two points. How many squares long is the river on the grid?
The lake is a rectangle. Its corners are (5, 2), (8, 2), (8, 4), and (5, 4). How many squares wide and how many squares tall is the lake?
Use your answer from item 8. Multiply the width by the height to find how many grid squares the lake covers. Each square is 1 foot across, so give the answer in square feet.
Explain why every painter in the class must start counting from the same corner, the origin. Write one or two sentences.
From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.
Answer Key
Answer: point (2, 9). The peak sits 2 squares right and 9 squares up from the origin. Check that the student marked and labeled that spot.
Answer: point (6, 3). The lake label is 6 squares right and 3 squares up from the origin.
Answer: point (9, 2). The town is 9 squares right and 2 squares up from the origin.
Answer: point (8, 9). The sun is 8 squares right and 9 squares up from the origin.
Answer: (1, 10). One square right is an x-value of 1, and ten squares up is a y-value of 10, so the pair is (1, 10).
Answer: 9; the town is 9 right and 2 up. The town point (9, 2) means 9 squares right and 2 squares up from the origin.
Answer: 4 squares. The river runs from a height of 8 down to a height of 4 along the same line, and 8 minus 4 is 4 squares.
Answer: 3; the lake is 3 wide and 2 tall. From x = 5 to x = 8 is 3 squares wide, and from y = 2 to y = 4 is 2 squares tall.
Answer: 6 sq ft. The lake covers 3 squares times 2 squares, which is 6 squares, and each square is 1 square foot, so the lake covers 6 square feet.
Answer: So every feature lands in the right place. If painters count from different corners, the same pair of numbers would point to different spots, and the mural features would not line up.
Differentiation
Support
Give students a grid with the x-values and y-values already numbered along the two edges, and mark the origin with a star. Let them plot items 1 through 4 with a partner before working the read-back items alone.
Extension
Ask students to add two more features of their own, such as a bridge and a rain barrel, choose a point for each, and write directions that would let a classmate plot the same two points without seeing the mural.
ELL supports
Provide a small picture card for each feature (mountain, lake, town, sun, river, and raincloud), with the word in the student's home language alongside English where possible. Model item 1 aloud, pointing to the right and then up while counting.
Extensions
Scale the plan up to a real wall or a large paper banner by making each grid square one full sheet of paper, and have teams paint the square that matches their assigned coordinates so the whole watershed comes together.