The Research: Teaching Geometry Through Art
Given the inherent connections between art and geometry, many articles have been written on the use of art to teach math. Art also has the ability to capture the attention of students in a way that straight math cannot always do1. Tessellations especially have the unique power to capture student attention in a variety of ways, and are also a great tool for teaching many different aspects of geometric concepts especially when it comes to transitioning to working on the coordinate plane2. Transformations on the coordinate plane are often difficult for students to comprehend, and using hands-on exercises using shapes and patterns to show concepts of reflections, rotations, and translations can help students cement the ideas into their memories3.
“Creativity is closely related to deep, flexible knowledge in content domains.4” When students can use the knowledge they’re learning in more than one environment, that is to say they can generalize what they’re learning to their greater world, then the concepts and big ideas are more likely to stick.
Some students struggle with math, and though the ultimate goal is to get them to understand the math as taught in the classroom, we have to meet the students where they are and let them show us what they know and what they’ve learned in their own way. As a group of specialists recently recommended: “Creative tasks should be included in the assessment methods of mathematics in order to capture not only the students who do well in school mathematics and are computationally fluent but also students who have the potential but have not manifested their abilities yet5.”
Comments: