Math Art Connection

No matter what age students you teach, whenever you are creating art, you can find a mathematical connection.

Art Math connections:

• Categorizing warm / cool colors
• Finding symmetries, rotations, or geometric shapes
• Measuring angles  video
• Looking at proportions
• Measuring curves or straight lines
• Investigating the golden ratio in art   video
• Discussing saturation of hues
• Using grids for perspective or for accurate drawings
• Using grids to change scale.  video
• Classifying media, styles, art movements, or anything else

Download Geometric Patterns from Digit Sums of Eight and One

The alternative, when you are teaching math yet looking for art projects, may seem more difficult.

Math Art Connections:

• Make geometric patterns from digit sums of multiples of eight and one – much easier than it sounds.
• Gentle math/art activities that give teachers a chance to watch students’ thinking in action.
• Paint half of a picture on half a page of paper, then fold to create a symmetrical image.
• Share a decorative graph  then invite students to make their own to highlight the concepts, part of the concepts, or an extension of the concepts.
• Illustrate a story that could go with an equation of the type being studied.
• Have young students illustrate what they do at various hours of the day; invite them to include an analog clock showing the time.
• Counting money? Check out this Money Math Collage Activity.
• Use geometric shapes to create a collage or potato prints.
• Assign a color to each digit, then look for patterns in multiples or factors of various numbers.
• Recycle paper into beautiful origami models.
• Measuring angles? Make realistic drawings of an open door, a hallway, houses along a street…
• Processing Percents? Make a beautiful color wheel sun with full saturation of colors at the center, then adding 10% more white to each color as the rays shine outward.
• Music IS Math!
• Square numbers and their roots star in this creative art project
• Dealing with Data? Explore then create colorful displays of information.
• Wherever there is multiplication there are patterns.

Multiplication patterns in the unit’s place

Art projects that display the idea being taught in math class boost the lesson’s effectiveness and offer students a chance to reflect on math concepts. Plus doing something colorful and creative is always interesting.