An Escher-Style Tessellation Project

Objective

Students will create a piece of art based on their own tessellating shape.

You'll Need

• A notecard for each student
• Scissors
• Tape
• A black pen or marker for each student
• A blank piece of paper for each student
• Colored pencils/crayons

Examples of Escher's Works

• Many of his "changing tessellations" are from this period
• Increasingly advanced tessellations
• My favorite of Escher's tessellations, built into a möbius strip!
• A set of links from Byrdseed.com

Other Resources

• The Color Scheme Designer website
• Wonderful examples of geometric shapes that tessellate
• A simple online tessellation designer from PBS
• A teaching book: Teaching Tessellating Art

Props to Mrs. Williams, my 4th and 5th-grade teacher, for showing me how to tesselate!

Steps

1. Students watch an introduction to tessellations.
2. Next, they create their own tessellating shape.
3. Finally, they repeat that shape to create a piece of tessellating art.