If you’re looking for a math art activity I highly recommend teaching your kids about Tessellations! Tessellations are repetitive patterns of shapes that fit perfectly together across a 2-dimensional plane of space (think of how floor tiles fit together, or the graphic artist M.C. Escher).
Creating tessellations is the perfect project for someone like my 8 year old, who loves fun math activities, yet needs a little extra encouragement when it comes to art: it’s creative but still systematic. You can use regular shapes like diamonds or other polygons, but it’s much more fun to make patterns with an irregular shape.
How to make tessellations:
The first thing you need is a square of heavy paper. I (cleverly) stuck a post-it on card stock to help my son cut a regular square.
Next:
- Draw two lines from corner to corner with the starting points of both lines in the same corner. It is not important that these lines are identical or of a certain arc. The only important quality is that they start and end in a corner.
- Cut along the lines.
- Tape the cutout segments to the opposite sides of the square.
- Use pattern (our resembled a gingko leaf!) to trace shape onto paper, fitting each new shape along the outline of the previous one.
Finally, once you’ve satisfactorily filled up your paper, color it in to your heart’s desire!
Kiddo decided to use his neon colored pencils and we ended up with some very bright artwork!
Watch our video!
If you like tessellations, you’ll love more awesome math art:
Heart tessellations – three ways!
Spirolaterals: practice multiplication and make art at the same time!
Math art books: picture books, activity books and more
Or, click the image below for more totally awesome ways to combine math and art:
Erin- The Usual Mayhem says
February 20, 2013 at 7:14 amWhat a great way to illustrate how they work! You could also break out some of Escher’s works to show the possibilities.
MomandKiddo says
February 20, 2013 at 9:55 amEscher is so fascinating. They love looking at his drawings.
thepicturebookreview says
February 21, 2013 at 12:33 amThis is a great idea and a great post! Thank you! I think I’ll start making some of these for my son to start coloring in. 🙂
MomandKiddo says
February 21, 2013 at 9:14 pmIt does make a really fun coloring page – just playing with patterns of colors is great fun.
PragmaticMom says
February 21, 2013 at 2:30 pmWow, I always wondered what tessellations were. Weren’t they in A Wrinkle in Time? or one of those books in that series? I love your art idea where art meets math! I’m pinning and tweeting!
MomandKiddo says
February 21, 2013 at 9:12 pmTessellations make me think of A Wrinkle in Time, too. But in the book they were tesseracts!
maryanne @ mama smiles says
February 22, 2013 at 9:40 pmThis is awesome! I’ll definitely try it with my kids!
Jeanette Nyberg says
February 24, 2013 at 8:55 amI can’t believe how great this project is! This is definitely a keeper. Thanks for the math/art inspiration.
MomandKiddo says
February 25, 2013 at 6:50 amIt was so, so much fun and the results are so pretty. I love that it can be done with different shapes, too.
Marie-Claude Leroux says
February 26, 2013 at 9:55 amWhat a great way to introduce tessalations – thanks!
(oh, and sticky note is clever 🙂
MomandKiddo says
February 26, 2013 at 10:23 amI thought it was clever, too! HAHA
Jamie says
March 2, 2013 at 6:52 amI do this at the end of the school year but have my middle school students color with fabric crayons. I then I iron their work onto a twin flat sheet and we make a tessellation quilt as a mini school.
MomandKiddo says
March 2, 2013 at 4:49 pmThat sounds like an amazing project!
Rebecca says
March 2, 2013 at 3:25 pmJust to let you know I’ve featured this on The Sunday Showcase: http://www.herecomethegirlsblog.com/2013/03/02/the-sunday-showcase-art.html
Hwee says
March 2, 2013 at 4:37 pmThis is such a great idea! Thanks for sharing.
Ashley says
March 3, 2013 at 9:53 amVery fun way to learn! Thanks for sharing at Mom’s Library!
Natalie says
March 3, 2013 at 7:23 pmI find it impressive that your son stuck with it. Maybe my daughter will too when she is 8 🙂
Jacquie says
February 19, 2014 at 4:27 pmFeaturing this at the Discover & Explore round-up this week! We just did a tessellation activity last week too (with a surprise type of media) – they are so much fun for kids 🙂