Room 13 students...

...have been learning about the five ‘regular solids’ – solid shapes where all the faces are the same. Each child has created the five regular solids themselves, using cardboard, glue and sellotape, learning about angles and geometry at the same time.

The ICOSAHEDRON is the most complex of these solid shapes, with 20 faces, all equilateral triangles. Dome theory, developed by famous designer R. Buckminster Fuller, is based on the idea of splitting these 20 faces into even smaller triangles, with some edges being shorter in order to create greater curvature. This is the basis of modern domes, some of which are very complex.

Room 13 have built one of the simplest of these using PVC pipe to create an entire sphere. The two different colours show the two strut lengths that were used. If you’d like to see it, it’s hanging in a tree outside Room 13.

Special thanks to Steve Wright, our caretaker, who climbed up into the tree to get the sphere attached!