4th Grade Art & Science Projects — Design and Discover — Engineering and Art Challenges
Students will create tessellation artwork and discover how repeating patterns in math and nature reveal God's orderly design.
A tessellation is a pattern of shapes that fit together perfectly with no gaps and no overlaps. You can see tessellations everywhere in God's creation — honeycombs, turtle shells, pineapple skin, and fish scales all show tessellation patterns.
Tessellations are based on math. Regular shapes like squares, triangles, and hexagons can tile a flat surface perfectly. The famous artist M.C. Escher created amazing tessellation artwork using shapes that transformed into animals and other figures.
To make a tessellation, you start with a simple shape and change it by cutting a piece from one side and taping it to the opposite side. When you trace this new shape over and over, it fits together perfectly like a puzzle.
The mathematical order behind tessellations is a reflection of God's nature. He is a God of order, not chaos. The patterns and structures we find in math and nature point to the mind of our Creator.
Create a tessellation by cutting a shape from one side of a square piece of cardboard and taping it to the opposite side. Trace your new shape repeatedly on a large piece of paper to fill the entire page with no gaps. Color your tessellation with a repeating color pattern to create a finished piece of art.