Can I turn the blocks?

Yes, and it is the only manipulative here you can. Select a block and drag its rotate handle. It snaps every 15 degrees so the 30 and 60 degree turns a pattern needs land exactly, and holding Shift turns it freely.

Why is there no total?

Because what a set of blocks is worth depends on the question. Six greens are a yellow if you are covering a hexagon and they are 360 degrees if you are meeting at a point. The readout counts the blocks and leaves the arithmetic to the class.

How many greens make a yellow?

Six, and the blocks here really do fit: they are all built from one side length, so a hexagon covered in triangles has no gaps and no overlap.

Pattern Blocks

Shape & Space · Reception–Year 5

The six wooden blocks. Drag them on and turn them to fit.

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About the pattern blocks

The six blocks from the wooden set, in their proper colours, so a teacher who says “pass me a blue” is asking for the shape a child expects. Drag them from the tray and turn them with the rotate handle to make them fit.

Every block has the same side length, and that is the whole design of the set rather than a detail: two greens make a blue, three make a red, six make a yellow, and they only fit together at all because the sides match. The shapes here are built from one measurement, so those relationships hold exactly.

The yellow hexagon and the red trapezium are drawn flat-topped, which means the trapezium really is the hexagon cut in half. A child who puts two reds together gets a yellow. Drawn any other way they would not fit, and the tool would be teaching the wrong thing very convincingly.

Use them for tessellation, for the fraction work that comes out of covering a hexagon, for symmetry, and for angles round a point: six greens meeting at a corner is 360 degrees, and a class can see why.

How to use it on your whiteboard

1Drag a block out of the tray, or tap it to drop one on the board.
2Select a block and use the rotate handle to turn it. It snaps every 15 degrees, so 30 and 60 are exact.
3Tidy up gathers the blocks into rows by kind.
4Tap Fullscreen so the blocks fill the board.

Questions

Can I turn the blocks?: Yes, and it is the only manipulative here you can. Select a block and drag its rotate handle. It snaps every 15 degrees so the 30 and 60 degree turns a pattern needs land exactly, and holding Shift turns it freely.
Why is there no total?: Because what a set of blocks is worth depends on the question. Six greens are a yellow if you are covering a hexagon and they are 360 degrees if you are meeting at a point. The readout counts the blocks and leaves the arithmetic to the class.
How many greens make a yellow?: Six, and the blocks here really do fit: they are all built from one side length, so a hexagon covered in triangles has no gaps and no overlap.