Intersection of 3 Planes

Today in Calculus and Vectors we were working on understanding the different ways 3 planes can intersect. We explored several situations as a class, and then each student was given a set of 3 planes to explore.

Students used matrices or elimination to decide if the planes intersected in a point, or a line, or didn’t intersect all together because they were either like an H (2 parallel and 1 not) or a triangular prism.

When they had decided, they cut out the 3 pieces of paper and slid them together to form a physical copy of their planes intersecting.

Having a different colour of card stock for each situation helped students find others with the same case, and they could trouble shoot their intersection calculations.

It was a nice way to end the week!