The Challenge: Fold a Miura fold. This was used on the Japanese “Space Flyer Unit” launched in 1995! (That website also has decent instructions.)
Materials needed: Patience, paper, some sort of pen/flat thing to sharpen creases.
Math concepts you could explore with this challenge: geometry, origami, symmetry
The Challenge: Build your own Hyperboloid
Materials needed: Skewers, Tiny rubber bands (I was able to get skewers at the grocery store and polybands from Target)
Math concepts you could explore with this challenge: Angles, geometric construction, lines, symmetry, topology, vertices/intersections
The Challenge: Make a chair fractal (That link will take you to the originators blog post about it. Seriously, go. It’s GREAT.)
Materials Needed: paper, pencil
Math concepts you could explore with this challenge: fractals, geometry, symmetry
The Challenge:
Materials Needed: Paper, pencil, colors
Math concepts you could explore with this challenge: angles, counting, geometry, lines, vertices/intersections
The Challenge: Fold an origami cube with windows. Possibly make multiple. (This could be a great collaborative activity for a class!)
Materials needed: 12 pieces of paper, cut to rectangles with a 1:2 ratio.
Math concepts you could explore with this challenge: angles, geometry, origami, sequences, symmetry, vertices/intersections
The Challenge: With a compass or with tech like Geogebra or Desmos Geometry, to recreate the Lotfallah Mosque Dome design.
Materials Needed: compass, straight edge, colors. You could also use graphing software for this.
Math concepts you could explore with this challenge: angles, circles, geometric construction, geometry, Islamic geometry, lines, polygons, proportions/ratios, symmetry, vertices/intersections
The Challenge: Fold you own octahedron from 6 square pieces of paper.
Materials Needed: 6 square pieces of paper.
Math concepts you could explore with this challenge: angles, geometric construction, geometry, origami, symmetry, vertices/intersections
The Challenge: Create your very own ellipse using just a compass or technology (I did one below using the free desmos.com/geometry)
Materials Needed: Compass, increasingly large circles to trace or graphing technology.
Math concepts you could explore with this challenge: Circles, geometric construction, geometry, symmetry, vertices/intersections
The Challenge: Suggested by Clarissa Grandi, to cut out and construct this flowered dodecahedron. Mine below followed by links to instructions.
Materials Needed: A set of these papers printed and cut from cardstock. (there are other sized pieces available at the links below.
Math concepts you could explore with this challenge: geometric construction, geometry, polygons, polyhedra, symmetry, vertices/intersections
The Challenge: To create this star.
Materials Needed: In an ideal world, you have a compass and ruler, but sans compass, you just need to do your best to divide a circle into 10 equal pieces.
Math concepts you could explore with this challenge: angles, geometric construction, geometry, islamic geometry, lines, vertices/intersections
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