Area Beading Art

We are learning about Area in Math right now. Area connects with Multiplication because when we calculate area, we have to multiply the length and the width. 

We are practicing finding Area using arrays. We know that we need to include the measurement at the end of the number. For Area, we measure length by width, so we write "units2" and call these "square units."

Ms MacCormick showed us some Indigenous Beading examples from an artist in Treaty 6 (click here to see the video and read the article). We are making our own artwork inspired by this artist and the concept of beading to share things that are important to us.

We got a sheet of paper with a long rectangle (an array) on it and we coloured in the squares. When we coloured, we couldn't make a curved line. We had to colour each box in one colour so it was like a bead. We tried to colour neatly for an art mark. 

For the design, it had to represent something important to us.  

The last step is to calculate the area of each colour. 

Here are some examples of our work: 

Things we liked and learned about this activity:

"I liked how we could choose our design and be imaginative with Math." ~ Mary Jane

"I really liked how you made the activity tricky so I learned more. The multiplication and figuring out the area of different shapes was tricky." ~ Oscar

"I got better at my multiplication facts." ~ Olivia

"I liked how instead of just doing a worksheet, we could make our own art and then multiply it." ~ Yulia

"I learned that drawing is easy but trying to measure the area of the array was harder." ~ Greta

"It was good because you gave us too much space so you can draw too much (lots of) things." ~ EA

"I learned that just because it looked like it was tricky and I couldn't do it, it doesn't mean that it's that hard. You just have to try and persevere." ~ Zoya

"I liked how you connected Social Studies with Math so we got more knowledge of both of them." ~ Thanve

"I learned that it was hard at first but if you try it, you can work more hard on it and it's not so hard." ~ ZA

"I liked that we got a chance to express ourselves. I liked that we got the chance to learn with our experience." ~ Asma