Origami

Fold in
Students fold exciting shapes to explore how changes in one dimension affect measurements in another.

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Joseph Georgeson

Students enjoy origami and like making everything from paper cranes to footballs out of small, colorful squares of paper. They can invent their own shapes and are intrigued by the polyhedrons that they can construct. Paper folding is fun, but where is the math? Unless teachers develop lessons that address mathematical objectives, origami could be nothing more than a cute activity. Take advantage of student interest and motivation to develop concepts and processes of algebra which, to many middle school students, is abstractand to connect algebra to something concrete and real. Area and volume are important, specifically in the study of geometry

and measurement. Beyond formulas, student understanding of these concepts is not always as secure as teachers sometimes think. Students often mistake area for volume or have difficulty understanding how changes in one dimension affect measurements in another. For example, when area remains constant, how are changes in length and width related to each other? In this activity, volume and area provide a meaningful context for studying patterns and functions. Using origami, students make paper models of cubes and, in the process, explore relationships and change. Students then manipulate their mod

els for more discoveries. The added benefit of making models of other polyhedra is that it will lead them to further algebraic investigations. This activity is by no means all that can or should be done. My intention is to motivate any interested mathematics teacher to find the mathematical potential of origami. Patterns and functions are integral to the study of mathematics, and algebra and origami can provide a meaningful as well as fun context in which to study them.

Unit oRigaMi Unit origami, sometimes called modular origami, involves folding sheets of square paper in the same way. One

MatheMatics teaching in the Middle school

Vol. 16, No. 6, February 2011

Copyright 2011 The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, Inc. www.nctm.org. All rights reserved. This material may not be copied or distributed electronically or in any other format without written permission from NCTM.

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how to Fold a Cube Unit

Follow these instructions to make cubes and other polyhedra. 1. start with a square. 2. Fold the paper in half, then unfold.

3. Fold the right and left edges in to the middle, then unfold.

4. Fold the lower-right and upper-left corners, as shown. Keep the edge behind the vertical line just a bit.

square sheet creates one unit. Units are then joined together to make structures, which are often regular polyhedra. To make a cube, 6 units are used; a stellated icosahedron requires 30 units (see fig. 1a). An Epcot ball can be produced with 270 units (see fig. 1b). Students can create their own structures and invent ways to put the pieces together to make intricate models. (See the sidebar at left for instructions on folding a cube unit.)
Fig. 1 students fold a regular polyhedra to explore various mathematical relationships.

5. Fold it again, making a double fold and bisecting the angle. Again, stay behind the vertical line a bit.

6. Fold both left and right sides to the middle line.

7. Fold the upper-right and lower-left sections to get the shape shown below. see two right isosceles triangles.

8. Tuck the triangle under the double fold to get the shape shown below. .

(a) Addies stellated icosahedron

9. Flip the unit over.

10. Fold the points to make a square. The double folds should appear.

(b) pauls 270-unit epcot ball

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Joseph GeorGesoN

students use beans to measure the volume of their cubes, then record the data in a table. Making the Cube

Any square piece of paper can be used to fold the basic unit for this cube. Begin the activity with 8-inch squares that have been cut from standard 8 1/2 in. 11 in. paper. Each student folds six squares and puts the units together to form a cube (see fig. 2). Building the cube will generate questions, many involving measurement. Even though the paper used for the units was an 8-inch square, the resulting cube does not have an edge of length 8 inches. What is the length of an edge of the cube? Students could use rulers, but other methods can enhance their understanding. Questions for students to consider include these: What if the size of the paper changed? Is volume a function of the size of the paper? Does doubling the size of the original square double the volume? If we used 4-inch squares of paper (instead of 8-inch squares), how would the volume change? If we used 16-inch squares of paper, how would the volume change? How would the area of the face of the cube change? How would the length of the cube change?
Fig. 2 A cube can be formed from
6 squares of origami paper.

Joseph GeorGesoN

Determining Volume

The first investigation involves the volume of the cubes that students constructed. The question posed is something like this: The volume of the cube that has been constructed depends on the size of the original square of paper; 8-inch squares were used. How would the volume change if different-sized squares of paper were used? For example, if the original square were cut in half (so that the paper is half the size), would the volume be half, as well? Students then work in groups, making cubes from various sizes of paper from squares that are 3, 4, 5, 5.5, 6, 7, and 8 inches. Every student does not make every size of cube, but each group makes a few samples. Students then determine the volumes of the cubes. By working in groups, students can construct cubes and measure their volume in one class period.
Counting the Volume

Students determine the volume in two ways: by measuring (1) with a nonstandard unit and (2) with calculations. First, because some students do not have a solid understanding of the concept of volumeas filling an empty space, for examplethey can use beans to fill each cube and then
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count the beans in each. The process does not take long. It is interesting to see how accurate this method is and if it shows the relation between volume and length of the original square of paper that was folded. Although a nonstandard unit, beans illustrate the concept of filling as a way to model volume. Further, beans are concrete and accessible to students with a variety of abilities. I have used beans large enough to count yet not so large as to cause errors because they create gaps when filling a container. Smaller beans could be used, as could other materials, but they would require additional time to count. An interesting question is how differences in materials affect the analysis. The volume would change numerically, but would the functional relation change? The use of a nonstandard unit supports the idea that volume is not always measured with a standard cubic unit. After filling the cubes and counting beans, students gather data and average them for each cube. Table 1 shows the information collected during the bean-counting process. The numbers are averages of several groups measurements. Students observe patterns in a table. Because the class has discussed direct relations, they wonder if this is such a pattern. Does doubling the length of the original square of paper double the resulting volume? The pattern in
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table 1 Using beans as a nonstandard unit, students measure the volume of different
sizes of cubes.

Fig. 4 After unfolding the basic unit,

students nd these fold lines.

length of the original square Paper 3 4 5 5.5 6 7 8

number of Beans needed to Fill the cube 42 93 186 260 344 535 800

Fig. 3 This graph of the bean-counting data from table 1 shows a nonlinear pattern.

What angles are formed by these fold lines? The face of the cube is hidden in these fold lines. Where is it? After some discussion, students usually recognize that the square in the middle is the face of the cube (see fig. 5a). Students can find the area of that square and determine the length of its side. Knowing the length will yield the volume. Generally, students use several methods to find the area. One method is described below: I can divide the square into 5 squares (they form a pentomino, or X), and the 4 triangles (the corners) form another square, and the triangles in the middle of each edge together form 2 more squares, yielding 8 squares together. Therefore, since the original square is 64 square inches, the middle square will be 1/8 of that, or 8 square units (see fig. 5b). Other students divide the entire square into triangles (see fig. 5a). They then reason that because there are 32 triangles and the big square is 64 square inches, each of those triangles is 2 square inches. The square in the middle would comprise 4, or a total of 8, square inches.

the table is not easy to discern, but students can see that it is not a direct relation. During the year, my students spend a lot of time representing patterns in three ways: using a table, writing an equation, and constructing a graph. It is natural, then, for them to graph the information from this table. They graph the data and observe that this relationship is obviously not linear (see fig. 3). At this point, students are not ready to find the equation, but they are ready to look mathematically at the problem. To do so, they uncover the fold lines hidden in the folded unit.
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Calculating the Volume

Unfolding the original unit reveals the mathematics of the polyhedra. My goal is to use the creases in the unfolded origami paper to find the volume of the cube, although other significant mathematics lies underneath this folded unit and could be used to extend this activity (see fig. 4). Many questions can be posed: Are the fold lines symmetrical? What kind of symmetry do they have? Many polygons are formed. How many can you find? Some of these polygons are squares. How many do you see?

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Some students use the Pythagorean theorem to find the measurements. They then demonstrate their thinking and their methods. In most cases, they are correct, but occasionally some misunderstandings are uncovered, which is good. Many valid methods can be used to find the required measurements, and all creative methods should be encouraged. Students find that the area in the middle is always 1/8 of the original square paper. This leads them to discover a pattern that extends to other sizes of square paper. The area of a face of the cube, therefore, is always 1/8 of the area of the original paper square. A second pattern that develops is the relationship between the side of a square face and its length. The root of the squares area, or the squares root, provides that connection. We generalize these patterns for a variety of original square lengths and find the volume by cubing the length. We also emphasize the common assertion in algebra that patterns and generalizations come from the problem, not from guessing. Seeing connections will lead to understanding patterns.

Fig. 5 After unfolding one unit, students identify the face of the cube as the center
square of the unfolded paper.

(a) paper divided into triangles

(b) paper divided into squares and partial squares

Table 2 shows the patterns found after students investigate the volume of the cube by using the fold lines from the unfolded paper. Students find patterns for the original 8-inch square of paper and then extend and generalize these patterns. At this point, students unearth the functional relationship among an independent variable, the length of the square paper that we folded to make the cube, and its volume.

The following function expresses this relationship:

x2 y = 8
3

How does the graph of this function compare with the graph of the data derived from counting beans? Figure 6 indicates that these graphs are very similar. However, to be expanded, the function needs to be transformed

table 2 students nd numerical patterns among the dimensions of the cube and the calculations. length of the original square (in inches) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 x area of the Face of the Resulting cube (in inches2) 0.125 0.5 1.125 2 3.125 4.5 6.125 8
x2 8

length of the cube (in inches) 0.35 0.71 1.06 1.41 1.77 2.12 2.47 2.83
x2 8

Volume of the cube (in inches3) 0.043 0.358 1.191 2.803 5.545 9.528 15.069 22.665
x2 8
3

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Fig. 6 The graph of the function matches the points when adjusted by a factor of 35. The relationship between calculated measures and volume in bean units is approximately 35:1.

with a factor of 35. But why 35? The answer lies in the relationship between cubic units and beans as a unit of volume. Students compare the numbers in the tables for volume in bean units with the volume in cubic-inch units. That ratio turns out to be approximately 35. This is the factor that students had tried as an expansion of the function. The equation
x2 y = 35 8
3

works well and is graphed in gure 6. The initial volumes, measured with beans, match fairly closely the volume function that was found algebraically.

Fig. 7 sierpinskis carpet provides a

recursive context for exploring exponential patterns.

Fig. 8 sierpinskis carpet in three dimensions provides a more complex and enriching context.

(a) stage 1

(a) stage 1

(b) stage 2

(b) stage 2

sieRPinsKis caRPet One of many extensions for this activityand a use for all the cubes that students produceis the construction of a fractal in three dimensions called Sierpinskis carpet. Fractals connect well to the study of traditional mathematical topics. Studying measurement (especially of volume) and finding patterns (specifically, exponential ones) are two topics among many that this extension involves. After students discover the patterns in Pascals triangle and investigate Sierpinskis triangle and its connections to exponential patterns, they can next consider the Sierpinski carpet that is based on squares rather than equilateral triangles. This fractal is generated by taking a square, cutting out the middle, and then repeating this process many times. Stage 0 is simply a square; stages 1 and 2 are shown in figure 7. Students then extend this square pattern to a pattern of cubes. This process leads to a three-dimensional model of Sierpinskis carpet. Stage 0 would be a solid cube; stages 1 and 2 are shown in figure 8. The models provide a context for exploring more patterns, specifically, exponential pat-

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of fold lines and their symmetry; the calculation of volume using concrete materials and mathematical formulas; the generalization of patterns numerically and algebraically; and the representation of patterns using tables, graphs, and equations are all contained in this exploration. The goal This shape, constructed from origami paper, provides rich math explorations. of this paper-folding SUMMARY exploration is to help Principles and Standards for School students uncover algeMathematics (2000) calls for students braic concepts and processes. to solve problems, reason and comcubes, is necessary. However, without This activity helps make the study municate their solutions, and connect understanding to back up this skill, of algebraic patterns and functions mathematical ideas. The exploration it is of little use to students. When more real to middle school students. presented here allows students to constudents are introduced to engaging Manipulative skill in algebra, as acstruct knowledge through investigatactivities, the inuence of algebra complished here while working with ing volume and change. The geometry can be unleashed. The end result will be deep understanding. Origami is a powerful connection between the Table 3 A natural extension of the cube activity is an exploration of Sierpinskis carpet, concrete world and the abstract world which reveals more numerical patterns. of mathematics. It is also a motivating activity for middle school students as Stage Number of Cubes Percent of the Total Volume well as their teacher. 0 1
1 1
JOSEPH GEORGESON

terns. We build a table and extend it to the general case; table 3 shows the percentage of the volume of Sierpinskis carpet, in three dimensions, which would be lled with cubes. In the table, if the image at a stage gets very large, the number of squares, as a percent of the total volume, gets very small. Thought of another way, as the cube gets very large, it becomes dominated more by the empty space than by the smaller cubes.

= 100% 20 27

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Franco, Betsy, and Diane Varner. Unfolding Mathematics with Unit Origami. Emeryville, CA: Key Curriculum Press, 1999. Fuse, Tomoko. Unit Origami, Multidimensional Transformation. Tokyo: Japan Publications, 1990. National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM). Principles and Standards for School Mathematics. Reston, VA: NCTM, 2000.
Joseph Georgeson, jgeorgeson@usmk12 .org, teaches algebra to eighth-grade students at the University School of Milwaukee in Wisconsin. He enjoys solving problems, nding patterns, and making connections to algebra that foster deep understanding.

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