Geometric Thinking through Textiles

As I was starting to plan the next math unit on Geometry, I thought about how art seems to be a natural connection to this strand. I wanted to make sure that the students in my class were thinking about shapes, symmetry, patterns, and rotations in a way that would allow them to make and create to solidify their understanding. (Hopefully!)

I went onto the Learning Lab site and started looking for inspiration. As a side note, the more I use this site, the more I love this tool. Not only are there many individual resources, but the collections that others create are so inspiring! I had a vague idea that I wanted to use some kind of textiles and was wondering if we could create again on the 3D printer. As I was searching, I came across a collection created by Christopher Sweeney - "3D Printing/Printmaking with Latin American Designs". This collection was a great springboard for my ideas - check it out if you have the chance. 

I collected many textile examples on Learning Lab, so I would have some choice when I showed the students. They looked at several examples, while we talked about the shapes, lines, and colors used, as well as the symmetry and rotations that we noticed. After a few minutes of exploration, we settled on one piece. The students explored this one deeply by using the routine "Looking 10x2".

Through the Learning Lab site, I was able to zoom in so we could all see the patterns closely, after we had a chance to see the unfinished edge. The zoom tool is great to use since it allows you to really look closely at something and examine each piece in detail. 

This particular artifact was great to discuss around symmetry because we had distinct thoughts on where symmetry was in this design. Some said that since the colors were different on either side of the diamond, then the shape was not symmetrical. Others said that forgetting the color and going by shape alone, we could find symmetry. As always, third graders were strong in their stance on this issue, but the beauty of using routines regularly in the classroom is that students were sharing and listening to different perspectives, and actively using evidence to support their stance. 

All this thinking gave the students ideas about how to approach their own design. Their next task was to take a grid paper and design four possible shapes that could be used to create a larger pattern overall. Some students zoomed through this step as they had many ideas and inspirations from the textiles we looked at.

 

After designing four, they had to choose one and then make it on TinkerCad. This is the second time the students have used TinkerCad to design something this year and we are all learning a lot about creating. The big learning curve this time was figuring out how to turn objects by a specific number of degrees. Through practice, students understood the difference between turning an object 90 or 180 degrees. It was fascinating to watch! This was the most challenging part for some students. 

Students had the task of making shapes with at least one line of symmetry. It was challenging, but they came up with unique designs.

 

 

  

The next step was using the piece that was 3D printed as a stamp to create a design, inspired by some of the textiles that we looked at.  We experimented with many different types of papers and paints to figure out what would work best. Acrylic paint on cardstock paper seemed to yield the best result - the paint held well and the paper wasn't too big to be intimidating to make a pattern.

We talked about different kinds of patterns and our Art teacher suggested this site to look at. The students talked about how they were exploring patterns in Art class too and mentioned some more types of patterns that they could consider creating with their shape.

Finally, they started to paint and print. First they "roughed up" the sides of their shape with a little bit of sandpaper. One student rubbed too hard and her shape became a bit lopsided. It was definitely a learning moment and she had to make sure she "rocked" her shape in the paint to ensure it was covered. Many students found this part challenging due to not being able to control the paint as much as they would like, and the nature of the plastic not always holding the paint as they hoped. 

The final results are beautiful. From afar, they have the feel of textiles since they are not perfect shapes or prints, with extra globs of paint or missing paint in some sections. 

 

It was a great assessment to see how students were interpreting the big ideas of symmetry and pattern.