Making 3D Shapes and Similar Objects using Scale Drawing
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Creating 3 Dimensional Drawings
One of my favorite activities each year is using scale factor to create three dimensional drawings. We do this activity when we are studying Unit Rates. There are a variety of reasons why this is one of my go to lessons.
Hands On
This activity gives students the chance to create something. The act of drawing, measuring, & designing is a nice change of pace from the usual worksheet avalanche. The actual act of creating this object allows students to see the relationship of sides all changing proportionally.
Creativity
This lesson gives students the opportunity to showcase their creative/artistic side. We have some basic guidelines, but in general students are free to design what appeals to them.
Visual
Many students are visual learners. For some students it easy to see difference between an object drawn to scale and an object that does not have a constant proportionality.
Connections with other classes
Art, Social studies (maps), industrial tech, and computer science classes are some of the classes that we are able to show a connection with. For example, our art classes use one point perspective drawings which share a ton of similarities with our scale drawings.
Differentiate
The activity allows you to increase (or decrease) the difficulty. For example, if you have a student that is struggling you can use a very simple shape such as the letter "L" or use a very easy scale factor such as 2. If you want to increase the intensity you can have students measure everything in inches (not centimeters) or require a very unusual scale factor such as 3/8 or 1.75.
