To make your own tessellations at home (or wherever you might have the supplies), begin with a small square. We used a three-inch by three-inch square (which happens to have an area of nine square inches).  The square, of course, has four sides which we called the left, the right, the top, and the bottom.

With scissors, cut a non-straight line from the bottom to the top without cutting any pieces off.  You will be left with two pieces that fit together like a puzzle.

Now, keeping the pieces oriented as they are when the puzzle fits together (In other words, do not flip or rotatethem.), slide the right piece over the left, so that the straight sides are touching.  Tape the straight sides together.

Beginning in the upper left corner of a full sheet of construction paper, line up the straight top of the taped shape with the top of the paper.  Trace the shape.  Sliding it to the right so that the left side of the shape fits within the right side of the tracing, keep tracing the shape.  When you have made it across the page, slide it down to make a second row.  Do the same until the larger paper is covered with the tessellated shape.  Trace over the pencil outline with a black marker.

Finally, alternating colors, use your crayons to neatly decorate the tessellated masterpiece.  Display it with pride; you have just tessellated!

I've posted some pictures of Hoggatt Cave as we have worked on each component, but with some of the final touches being formed over the last couple of weeks, some may want to see what's new.

In addition to the "billboard" in the hall, we have a sizable colony of tiny bats exiting the cave at our doorway.  Other bats are handing out just inside the door, as well.

The waterfall hosts cave trout and crickets, while our column stands regally just a few feet away.  Soda straws and stalactites may lead the way to prehistoric paintings on the wall, along with our first president's signature.

The "original" entrance has been located again, and the original rope still hangs where I entered the cave for the first time in 1996.  Some bones of animals have been discovered deep into the cavern.  Finally, our healthy bat colony has fortunately not suffered from the White-Nose Syndrome that plagues other caverns in this area.

This year, the "billboard" in the hallway announces that Hoggatt Cave is Opening Soon.  I made the letters out of cave brochures I've collected.  The bats interrupted the completion of the board as they exited for dinner, so I left them alone.  They cross the board and extend beyond its borders.

ALAHNAH, HOLDEN, and JACOB toughed out our recent classroom Spelling Bees to qualify as classroom finalists for Friday's competition.  All three have something to be happy about as they put forth a fine effort.

We are proud to announce that ALAHNAH and HOLDEN earned their places in next week's school Spelling Bee.  They will compete against representatives from the other fourth and fifth grade classes.  We, of course, wish them the best.

Build the wall!

No, we're not talking about that wall; we're really talking about looking for patterns in the bricks of a wall.

It all started with a look at Thomas Jefferson's house at Monticello.  We started by contrasting George Washington's house with Thomas Jefferson's.  After studying how bricks are made now, and contrasting the process with the 18th century process, the class used actual bricks to form "pyramids" and then "grow" them, one level at a time.  We recorded our observations while discovering some patterns in the data along the way.

What if the bricks extended to ten levels high?  A hundred?  How could we use the pattern we discovered to figure out the answers to those questions?

Here was a fairly simple project, that took the project off a worksheet and made it real for fourth graders.