27/05_Create your own emblem

Everybody likes to feel part of the group, and this is indeed important in our classroom. My proposal for today is to create their own emblem with geometric figures. This can be done in numerous ways and using different techniques to achieve that. What can the theme of our badge? Let’s give some ‘situations’:

·         We are part of the graphic design of the different houses of Harry Potter: Slytherin, Gryffindor, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff. The different houses have decided to do a makeover of their badge and they have asked for your help. Dividing the class into four groups, they have to redesign the badge of their house.

·         We would like to create the emblem of the class. The sense of community is something that brings people together and this is a good way to promote such feeling. Between different groups, we can do a competition, and the most original one would represent our class. 

·         If we want to have our students working individually, we can ask them to create the emblem of their family. 

 

Hogwarts houses

This is a quite creative project, and it can be done dividing the tasks. One can be in charge of the design, other can create the animals or objects if necessary. One third person can do research about which features define the family or which feeling we want to translate into our emblem. We might we some guide, saying that they have to use certain proportions between the objects, but the less we give instructions the more originals the results will be. In the website The Spruce Crafts we can find five shield templates to create their own emblem. These shields can conform our frames to create geometric forms such like we have seen in the post ‘Complexity in Islamic designs’ (24^thof May). 

Shield pattern one. [Source: Kate Pullen]

 

 Shield pattern two. [Source: Kate Pullen]

 Shield pattern three. [Source: Kate Pullen]

 Shield pattern four. [Source: Kate Pullen]

Shield pattern five. [Source: Kate Pullen]

We can adapt this activity depending on our necessities and the context. Were we to have a group of first year students, we might consider use stablished patterns just like these ones so that they only have to cut with scissors. However, if they are older, we can ask them to create more complex figures with non-established patterns. 

What is more, we can think about doing this activity with GeoGebra if they are already familiar with the program. On the other hand, they can do it by hand, doing geometric patterns such like this:

Handmade coat of arms. [Source: https://hermathness.com/2014/03/27/geometry-update/]

 

In this website you can do your own coat of arms digitally with preestablished elements too: http://www.makeyourcoatofarms.com/app.asp Stay tuned for next posts!

 References

Her Mathmess [Screen name]. (2014, March 27). Geometry update. Retrieved from https://hermathness.com/2014/03/27/geometry-update/

Make your coat of arms. [Website 2.0.]. Retrieved from http://www.makeyourcoatofarms.com/app.asp

Pullen, Kate. (2018). Five Free Shield Templates for Cards and Scrapbook Pages. In The Spruce Crafts. Retrieved from https://www.thesprucecrafts.com/shield-templates-for-cards-and-scrapbook-2906078?utm_source=pinterest_ip&utm_medium=sm&utm_campaign=shareurlbuttons