"I don't really know how I did that!"

By: R. Scott Eberle

This article was about geometry, specifically the use and idea of tessellations. The teacher provided students with different shapes and asked them to create different kinds of tiled patterns. The teacher explained that most students understand how to make the tiled patterns with actual tiles but sometimes when they are asked to draw the pattern they struggle with how to make it look like how it should. The teacher then went on to explain how it is important that teachers allow their students to try tiling with different shapes, rather than just squares. When he allowed for his students to do this some of the discoveries they found we pretty cool. For example one boy discovered that tiling with triangles with make hexagon figures as well. Where another little girl discovered that the way she ordered her L shaped title was different than the way her friend did and they were able to create two completely different patterns. The teacher also explained that with tessellations it is important to talk about the different lines of symmetry that the students are able to draw from their pattern. He also mentioned at the very end that this is a good activity to use for an inquiry lesson with geometry.    

I thought that this was a good article to read about geometry. I think that a lot of times teacher push aside the importance of this topic in the classroom. I really liked that it went of to explain how different patterns can be made within shapes. I also like that the teacher provided his students with the chance to use inquiry skills. The only thing I didn't like about the article was that I felt like it started to become a little repetitive and the end of it. Overall though, I want to do an activity like this with my students in the future I think they would really benefit from this knowledge.