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 The Weave of the World: What's Dance Got To Do With Math? Just About Everything. But for their young students, performing for peers was only one challenge. Facing the bewildering and timeworn trials of adolescence presented a host of others. Boys and girls had to touch and trust each other as dance partners. They had to muster their still-developing powers of coordination and rhythm. And the choreography required them to think both concretely and abstractly. The adults stood by as the youngsters persevered with surprising maturity. Forming movement tessellations with their own bodies helped many students to grasp the differences between a regular tessellation and a semiregular tessellation. It also helped them to understand how to accomplish symmetry in patterns by rotating, reflecting, translating, and glide reflecting. The project earned high marks, not only from students but also from parents who remarked on their children's surging enthusiasm for math class. "All my anxieties were worthless!" says Lang, "It worked out really well." It is now several weeks after the project, and students sit on the floor, reflecting on the experience. They're eager to share their thoughts, and their words tumble over each other's in an ebullient rush. "It was easier translating a glide reflection in the dance. I never understood it when we were just moving shapes around on paper." "I had to look at it on paper first before I could do it in the dance." "I didn't like math, it was boring, and I didn't want to come to class and do nothing. Now, I kind of got into it." "Dance is filled with mathematics, you just have to find it." In addition to learning mathematics, it's evident that students also learned a little more about themselves. "I learn better in groups, where you can learn from each other." "Some people have individual talents, and they can bring that to the group." "We had to cooperate. If both people weren't cooperating in a counterbalance, you'd fall over." So, what role can art play in mathematics? A quiet voice answers from the back: "It cleans the mind and the soul." The students laugh at their classmate's poetics, but they nod, eyes bright. Denise Jarrett is a writer with NW Regional Education Laboratory's Mathematics and Science Education Center. |
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