Patterns of the Universe Part 2

Yesterday I found Patterns of the Universe at the MIT book store:

and did a little intro project with the boys last night:

Patterns of the Universe Part 1

This morning we went back to the book to have each of the boys look at a new pattern in more detail. Here’s what my younger son picked:

 

and here’s how he colored it in and some thoughts he had about the shape:

 

My older son picked the Harriss spiral – here are his initial thoughts. I was excited to hear that he wanted to learn more about this shape:

 

Here’s how he colored it in and also his description of the pattern – “it sort of reminds me of how a tree behaves”:

 

I’m really happy to have this book. It is a great way to get kids thinking (and talking) about both patterns and math that they might not be seeing in school. The process of coloring in the patterns gives them lots of time to think about the math, too, which hadn’t occurred to me before watching them work in their patterns this morning.