Mathematics has been considered one of the central pillars of academia and civilization in general for millenia.  Since the time of the ancient peoples of Greece, India, and China, mathematics has been studied by our most eminent scholars.  Many people know this and realize the impoartance of mathematics to our society, but fewer people realize that for much of its existence, mathematics was almost exclusively geometry and the rest of this broad field of study (arithmetic, algebra, trigonometry, calculus, etc...) would scarcely even exist without the grounding provided by Geometry.

 A stellar example of this is the Ancient Greeks, considered by many scholars to be the inspiration for almost all of Western culture to date.  The Greeks are well known for their contributions to philosophy, literature, law, science, engineering, architecture, and of course, mathematics.  What many forget -- or never knew to begin with -- is that in Ancient Greece, mathematics was really just Geometry, mostly because of the inadequacy of their number system.  It is for this reason that most of Greece's ancient architecture was highly geometric in nature, specifically their temples.

Your task is to work with your group to design a temple for the worship of a chosen patron god or goddess.  You must use your skills in Geometry to create a temple demonstrating the artistic qualities of Geometry (which the Greeks appreciated so much) while also embodying the themes associated with your chosen deity.
You and your team have three weeks to do research and design your temple.  Good luck and god (or goddess!) speed!

This project serves as a mean to multiple academic ends.  The project will empower you and your team with a greater depth of knowledge regarding a variety of geometry topics, including polygons, area and volume, congruence, and transformations.  Through this project, you will experience creating detailed, realistic blueprints with precision and accuracy.  Finally, this project will teach you all much about architecture, religion, and culture in ancient Greece.

To streamline the design and creation of your temple blueprint, assign the following jobs to each of your group members:

Designer:  The designer is charged with designing the patterns and other creative designs of the temple.  As designer, you essentially plan the general layout of the temple.

Mathematician:  The mathematician's job is to determine the scale and proportions of the temple and to make sure they are clear for the architect to draw the blueprint while also ensuring that the creative decisions of the designer are properly employed.

Architect:  The architect creates the final draft of the blueprint for submission.  You will have to accurately display the creative designs of the designer while staying accurate to the scale and proportions dictated by the mathematician.

Obviously, all group members are encouraged to take part in every step of the creative process involved in creating the temple -- in fact, the temple will likely benefit from multiple perspectives.

The blueprint can be created in a variety of ways.  I reccomend using Geogebra with the axes and gridlines shown, but any accurate display of the blueprint is acceptable.  Other possible avenues for creating the blueprint include (but are certainly not limited to) pencil and paper, Geometer's Sketchpad, CAD or similar computer drafting programs, or Adobe Illustrator (if they're available to you).  

First, chose a god or goddess to dedicate your temple to.  Pick one of the following gods or goddesses:

• Zeus - King of the Gods
• Hera - Queen of the Gods
• Aphrodite - goddess of love and beauty
• Apollo - god of light, truth, healing, archery, music, poetry
• Ares - god of war 
• Artemis - goddess of hunt, moon, children 
• Athena - goddess of wisdom, war, patriotism and good citizenship
• Demeter - goddess of grain, agriculture, fertility
• Dionysus - god of wine, vegetation, and theater
• Hades - god of the underworld
• Hephaestus - god of forge and fire
• Hermes - messenger of the gods, god of motion, travelers, commerce, thieves, and sheep
• Hestia - goddess of the hearth and home
• Poseidon - god of the sea, earthquakes, and horses

If you chose a different god or goddess, it must be verified with me first.

Before designing a temple to your god or goddess, you must learn more about him or her.  What is she the god of?  What was she known for?  What kind of relationship did she have with her worshippers?  Some useful informations can be found at the links below.  You can find even more information doing your own research as well:

Introduction to Greek Mythology

Greek Gods

Greek Myths

Now that you've all researched your god or goddess and have selected a role on the team (Designer, Mathematician, Architect), it's time to start your blueprint!  The specific criteria for the blueprints can be found at the bottom of this page.  Be sure to include the layout of the floor (top view), drawings of each side of the outer temple (front, back, sides, roof).  The final blueprint must be submitted electronically.  If you use GeoGebra, you can simply send me GeoGebra files for the various pieces of blueprints.  If you use pencil and paper, you should scan the image and send me the image file (make sure the scan is clear and legible, otherwise you will lose points!).  If you use another method for producing your blueprint, please submit the final draft to me as an image file so I can view it without any extra software (.pdf is acceptable as well, if that's more convenient for you). The temple design must include themes related to your specific god or goddess (lightning for Zeus, water of water creatures for Poseidon, the moon for Artemis, etc...).  That said, the group must also produce a paper to accompany the blueprint which details the designs and themes used and why they were chosen for your temple.  It may be helpful to study the great Greek temples of the past -- such as the Temple of Zeus, the Temple of Artemis, or The Parthenon -- and draw inspiration from them.  If you do so, make a note of it your designs/themes paper.
Some common temple designs from Ancient Greece are shown in the image below.  Click the image to view a link going into greater detail about the various designs.

Upon completion of your blueprint you should make sure that you have satisfied the following criteria:

• Blueprints must include the following geometric objects:
• Pattern created using a reflection of a shape
• Pattern created using a translation of a shape
• Pattern created using a rotation of a shape
• At least 5 of the following shapes:
• Triangles
• Right Triangle
• Obtuse Triangle
• Acute Triangle
• Isosceles Triangle
• Equilateral Triangle
• Scalene Triangle
• Quadrilaterals
• Square
• Rectangle
• Parallelogram
• Rhombus
• Trapezoid
• Kite
• Circle
• Regular Polygons (for the sake of simplicity, no more than 8 sides)
• Blueprints must be scaled properly
• Blueprints must be designed around the chosen Greek god or goddess and all designs should relate to the attributes of that deity.
• Blueprints must be complete and labeled properly.
• The blueprint must include views from the front, back, top, and both sides.

Your project will be evaluated using the following rubric:

Congratulations on your completion of a new temple design! You've come very far and learned a lot over the course of this assignment.  You worked together with your team mates to research deities, design a temple, and create a detailed, to-scale blueprint of your design.

But this is only the beginning of your adventure into the world of mathematics and architecture!  Time has given us myriad new design styles, many with mathematical basis, and even more wonderous structures to admire, study, and draw inspioration from.  Although the project is officially complete, you are encouraged to continue your study independently of past and modern feats of architecture and engineering.  A few interesting links are provided below to help kickstart your exploring:

The Pyramids at Giza

The Great Wall of China

The Pyramid Complex at Teotihuacan

The Tajmahal

The Ideal Palace in France

The Gherkin

The general theme and much of the specific design of this WebQuest lesson is adapted from Richard Morgan's WebQuest, A Temple to the Gods.  Much thanks to him for the inspiration for this lesson.
Permissions
We all benefit by being generous with our work. Permission is granted for others to use and modify this WebQuest for educational, non-commercial purposes as long as the original authorship is credited. The modified WebQuest may be shared only under the same conditions. See the Creative Commons Attribution • Non-Commercial • Share-Alike license for details.
Images used in this WebQuest were copied from the following websites, in the order the images appear on this site:

http://goldenratiomyth.weebly.com/the-human-body.html

http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/pythagoras%20theorem

http://murderiseverywhere.blogspot.com/2012/10/bouchercon-hiatus-4-gree…

http://atheism.about.com/library/FAQs/religion/blgrk_temples02.htm

http://employees.oneonta.edu/farberas/ARTH/ARTH209/Parthenon_gallery.ht…

Introduction

One of the great struggles of teaching mathematics is connecting it to other disciplines outside the math class.  This WebQuest enables that interdisciplinary connection while never losing sight of the focus of the class.  Connecting Greek Mythology and Architecture with Geometry is a great example for students because the Greeks are oft-revered as the founders of the Western World and making math relevant to them will emphasize its great importance.  This connection opens up the doors for discussing the connection between mathematics and all of architecture, engineering, and design which leads to art, literature, music, philosophy...
Aside from the great interdisciplinary value of the lesson, this project also necessitates teamwork and leadership in each group.  The roles within each group reflect actual roles within the professional field that emphasize the importance of a variety of different kinds of intelligence.

Learners

This WebQuest is designed for high school geometry students, specifically targeted at 9th and 10th grade (as these are the grades in which most students would take a high school geometry class).  This lesson can be started at any point during the unit it is a part of, but it should really be started after the students already have a knowledge of the required shapes and transformations.  The WebQuest isn't so much a teaching substitute as it is a tool for reinforcement and interdisciplinary emphasis.  This makes it ideal for geometry students at any level of understanding (basic knowledge to advanced comprehension).

Standards

MCC9-12.G.CO.6  Use geometric descriptions of rigid motions to transform figures and to predict the effect of a given rigid motion on a given figure.

MCC9-12.G.CO.12  Make formal geometric constructions with a variety of tools and methods (compass and straightedge, string, reflective devices, paper folding, dynamic geometric software, etc.)