Find out how angles and symmetry come into play in the game of pool in this video adapted from Annenberg Learner’s Learning Math: Measurement.
Meet San Francisco artist Sirron Norris, who discusses his public and commercial art projects. Although he works on projects like "Bob's Burgers," he still makes time to teach a cartoon-drawing class for kids every Saturday. He says that the best part about drawing cartoons is that there's no expectations. He teaches the children this, and that as long as they are proud of what they've created, then what they've created is perfect.
This activity allows students to explore reflective symmetry. They are asked to color a given arrangement of triangles in symmetric patterns using specific numbers of colors. The Teachers' Notes page includes suggestions for implementation, discussion questions, ideas for extension and support, and printable sheets
Shape is one of the seven basic building blocks of art along with Line, Form, Texture, Value, Space, and Color. Using still life paintings of fruit, we look into how artists' create their individual style and develop a unique approach to making shapes.
Check out the entire collection of KQED Art School videos!
David Huffman is a Bay Area artist who heavily uses basketballs and astronauts as symbols of African Americans' cultural trauma and historical homelessness. He uses these two specifically because they serve as metaphors for self-discovery in a place that has been previously hostile. Basketball is a sport that connects cultural divides, and the astronaut suit protects those who are venturing into dangerous places in order to see things they have never seen before.
The goal of this task is to use geometry study the structure of beehives. Beehives have a tremendous simplicity as they are constructed entirely of small, equally sized walls. In order to as useful as possible for the hive, the goal should be to create the largest possible volume using the least amount of materials. In other words, the ratio of the volume of each cell to its surface area needs to be maximized. This then reduces to maximizing the ratio of the surface area of the cell shape to its perimeter.
This activity provides an opportunity for students to work on spatial visualization and number sense together. Learners are presented with a hundred grid and told there is another printed on the reverse side. They must work out the unseen numbers for several positions on the grid. Ideas for implementation, extension and support are included along with a printable sheet of grids.
This activity allows students to investigate line symmetry and reflections. Using a mirror, students locate the lines of symmetry. in a square and then proceed to find other shapes by reflecting parts of the square. Ideas for implementation, extension and support are included along with a printable worksheet of squares (.doc)
This is an instructional task that gives students a chance to reason about lines of symmetry and discover that a circle has an an infinite number of lines of symmetry. Even though the concept of an infinite number of lines is fairly abstract, fourth graders can understand infinity in an informal way.
This task provides students a chance to experiment with reflections of the plane and their impact on specific types of quadrilaterals. It is both interesting and important that these types of quadrilaterals can be distinguished by their lines of symmetry.
This task is intended for instruction, providing the students with a chance to experiment with physical models of triangles, gaining spatial intuition by executing reflections.
This course covers the mathematical techniques necessary for understanding of materials science and engineering topics such as energetics, materials structure and symmetry, materials response to applied fields, mechanics and physics of solids and soft materials. The class uses examples from the materials science and engineering core courses (3.012 and 3.014) to introduce mathematical concepts and materials-related problem solving skills. Topics include linear algebra and orthonormal basis, eigenvalues and eigenvectors, quadratic forms, tensor operations, symmetry operations, calculus of several variables, introduction to complex analysis, ordinary and partial differential equations, theory of distributions, and fourier analysis. Users may find additional or updated materials at Professor Carter's 3.016 course Web site.
How well do your students understand the properties of quadrilaterals and the vocabulary that is used to describe them? Use these Venn diagrams as a way for students to prove which quadrilateral is being described.
Use this Venn diagram to get students thinking about the different types of symmetry as they use the mathematical practices.
Do you like to paint? Watch this step by step video as artist Kristin Farr demonstrates how to paint your very own "Magic Hecksagon," which is a colorful, geometric design inspired by folk art. She uses a plethora of different colors to bring a sense of motion to her work. Watch and learn more in the interview with Kristin Farr: http://youtu.be/OX1r-3-VK-0
In this video segment from Cyberchase, a plant expert shows Bianca the patterns and symmetry found in nature.
In this problem students use spatial awareness and visualization to solve problems related to reflection (bilateral) symmetry. Learners are given three shapes and must assemble as many different but symmetrical composites as possible. Ideas for implementation, extension and support are included along with printable sheets of the shapes and a poster.
This is a lesson plan that introduces rotational and reflectional symmetry with geometric shapes, focusing on regular polygons. Notes (two copies: a student version and also an answer key, both as a Word doc and a PDF), assignment, and cut-out shapes are provided.
This is a lesson plan that introduces rotational and reflectional symmetry with geometric shapes, focusing on regular polygons. Notes (two copies: a student version and also an answer key, both as a Word doc and a PDF), assignment, and cut-out shapes are provided.***The BULK of this lesson (All the really well done parts) were not me, but were done by Kimberly. My addition was the Geogebra aspect
This is a lesson plan that introduces rotational and reflectional symmetry with geometric shapes, focusing on regular polygons. Notes (two copies: a student version and also an answer key, both as a Word doc and a PDF), assignment, and cut-out shapes are provided. There is a final project, with both instructions and an example included. Cover image: Christensen, K., 2022. Reflectional Symmetry of an Atom [screenshot] (Keynote presentation, Rotational and Reflectional Symmetry Assignment).