If there is one item in my 4 year-old class that thrills every single one of my students, it is my set of pattern blocks.  My class loves to create patterns and pictures with shapes, creating art and objects using squares, hexagons, triangles and quadrilaterals.  This activity always manages to lead the child to discover the properties of shapes in regards to angles and sides: how different shapes can “interlock”, which shapes work best for creating patterns, and which shapes do not work at all. Read more…