Did you know that the word ‘dice’ is actually the plural of the word ‘die’? So if you are playing a game with only 1, you should say ‘roll the die’ instead of ‘roll the dice’.
1. What shape is the die?
2. How many faces does the die have? (Hint: there are dots that represent numbers on each of the faces, which might give you a clue.)
3. Can you suggest what practical difficulties there might be if we used the following 3-D shapes as dice?
a) sphere b) cuboid
4. a) Why do most dice have rounded corners? b) Count the number of corners (vertices) on a cube (die).
5. What do you notice about the opposite faces of the die? (Hint: try combining the numbers.)
6. Now that we know what the faces and corners (vertices) of a cube are, what do you think the edges are? How many of them are there?
7. A cuboid has the same number of faces, edges and vertices as a cube, so what is the difference between a cube and a cuboid?
8. Examine the following 3-D shapes and then fill in the table.