We've been talking about Native Americans (or American Indians) in fourth grade. Did you know that the Eastern Woodland tribes are really the only ones that used asymmetry? It's a great math connection for them and I heard from a classroom teacher that their knowledge of this concept has really carried over to their math lessons. YES!!!!!
They're made with 9 x 12 construction paper and a bunch of paper scraps, including velor paper (just because I love it). I talked to them a lot about layering, repeating shapes, etc.
So many times the students think, 'well, I made an eyebrow here and a slightly smaller one here, so now it's asymmetrical' and I want them to take it a little further. I want them to be obviously asymmetrical. One of our principals came in and walked around one day and said "why are they all creepy looking?" and that's when some of them took a more gruesome turn:
We had talked as a class about how we felt looking at some American Indian masks that looked like this and this. We agreed on words like "uncomfortable" and "creeped out," I just wish I would've had the students answer the principal instead of jumping in.
It was a fun project for the end-of-the-year madness (two and a half more weeks!)
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