Act 1
1. How many boards will he need?
2. Write down a guess.
Act 2
3. What information would be useful to figure this out?
4. Write down some questions you have in your head right now.
Act 3
Sequel
5. What would happen if each block was 1 foot long?
6. What would happen if each board was 6 feet long?
Common Core Standards
6.NS.A.1
Interpret and compute quotients of fractions, and solve word problems involving division of fractions by fractions, e.g., by using visual fraction models and equations to represent the problem.
6.NS.B.2
Fluently divide multi-digit numbers using the standard algorithm.
7.NS.A.3
Solve real-world and mathematical problems involving the four operations with rational numbers.
6.NS.A.1
Interpret and compute quotients of fractions, and solve word problems involving division of fractions by fractions, e.g., by using visual fraction models and equations to represent the problem.
6.NS.B.2
Fluently divide multi-digit numbers using the standard algorithm.
7.NS.A.3
Solve real-world and mathematical problems involving the four operations with rational numbers.
When Math Happens 
Why 6? 480 total inches are needed. each board is 96 inches long. 96 multiplied by 5 is 480.
Hey Lisa,
The reason why it comes out to 6 is because there is a little left over on each long board. Since each block needs to be 10 inches, this only allows 9 blocks to be cut from each long board. Therefore, 5 long boards would only produce 45 blocks. Since this isn’t enough for the full set of 48, we had to get an extra board to make up for it.
Hope that helps!
Oh my gosh, I feel so dumb! I was so focused on the math that I forgot to think about cutting the boards. Thank you! This is exactly something my students would do. Thanks for replying so quickly.
Haha I actually did the same thing when thinking through it at first. Very common. It’s good to be in our students’ shoes every once in a while.
My Jenga game has 18 layers. The life sized version in this lesson has 16 layers. Is there a reason for the lack of 2 layers like the game I bought?
Hey Chelsea! I just based it off the knock-off brand that I bought at the store. It has 16 layers. No good reason otherwise!
If the width of each block is 4 inches, and there are 3 blocks per layer, wouldn’t the length of each layer be 12 inches? Meaning each block would have to be 12 inches long to make the square in each level? Why did you go with a length of 10 inches?
Hey Lisa,
Thank you for your question. It’s been a while since I made this, so my memory is fuzzy. I can’t remember why, but the blocks ended up needing to be 10 inches. Maybe the 2×4’s really weren’t 4 inches wide exactly? That’s my best guess.