This week I chose to try part of the Scott Kim and Karl Schaffer Making Stars video with my Math 9 class as a warm up, specifically the section where they used their hands to create 2 different 5-pointed stars:
We are working on identifying, explaining and creating patterns, so I asked them to watch for the base, repeating unit of the pattern (we called it the peace sign). Inspired by my reading this week, I followed the exploratory outline of Vogelstein et. al (2019) by having students dissect the video clip to see if they could figure out how the performers did the shapes, then reenact the two 5-pointed stars, and finally create their own shape with a different hand base unit.
It was fun! Right away I noticed aspects of ensemble learning, as everyone in the table group needed to provide a hand in order for the shapes to work. This got even my most reluctant to participate involved. Reenactment was powerful. While they all got the first star shape right away, the second took a few tries, figuring out who had to join who for finger placement. Extended shapes included peace-sign suns, a heart made out of feet, a square made out of bent arms and a flower made out of hands cupped to make petals.
References:
Kim, S. & Shaffer, K. (n.d.). Making Stars [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkIm02yYoog
Nichola, This looks like a lot of fun. I really love how easy it was for you to connect your current curricular topic, to the video, and to having fun. This means it is a great activity as a warm up to this topic! Well done.
ReplyDeleteWow, beautiful! And I'm so glad that this worked well with your students. I see you using your earlier insights about reenacting and re-making mathematical art as a starting point for innovation -- lovely. This is really fascinating.
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