Customer Reviews

Beginner's Book of Modular Origami Polyhedra: The Platonic Solids (Dover Origami Papercraft)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

My son is addicted to origami. We gave him the origami calander and he was done well before the year was out. The airplane origami books also tired quickly. We have him this book about 2 months ago, and although my house is now filled with origami cubes and stars and whatnot... he is still interested in it! The down-side is that you make the same shape over and over again, but that does not seem to bother him. A few peices also do better if strengthened with tape or glue. What he loves best about this though, is using chocolate wrappers, or gum wrappers, or whatever is on hand to create a piece. Gather a dozen hersey's wrappers, and you have a lovely cube! It has been well worth the money spent!

For the price one could hardly do better - this book offers many simple (to fold - not always that easy to assemble, especially the last piece!) and beautiful geometric modulars, and while it's not exhaustive, it's a great place to start. I heartily recommend it!

The "Beginner's Book of Modular Origami Polyhedra" is a very good starting place for those who want to move their Origami beyond the traditional swans, boats, etc.

The project instructions in this book are well laid out, fairly easy to follow, and the forms produced are very cool. The completed polyhedra shapes are sturdy and make great desk "toys".

Highly Recommended!

As a beginner in origami I am grateful to have come upon this book. The projects are well worth the efforts it took me to produce them. The instructions are better than many books I've tried. Constructing the pieces is the easy part -- joining them together into the finished module is a bit trickier, but oh so rewarding! I have used these as unique gifts and special learning projects for kids I work with. Using a heavier weight paper produces very sturdy models. I highly recommend this book for anyone wishing to venture into the fascinating arena of modular origami!

The five Platonic solids are excellent demonstrators of the fundamentals of three-dimensional geometry. They are easy to understand and the theoretical reason why they are the only such solids is one of the most understandable of proofs. The situation is further improved when it is possible for the student to create the objects and that task is made very easy by the material in this book.
The authors first introduce the basic terminology used to describe the folding and then use detailed diagrams to further illustrate the basic folds that will be used. With these tactics as a base, the creation of all of the five Platonic solids is demonstrated. In some cases more than one technique is illustrated.
Most mathematics is abstract, the manipulations needed to work with the objects is often done in the head rather than with a physical object. However, when it is possible to actually create the objects, it is a pleasure for both the instructor and the students. Provided of course that there is a set of instructions that are easy to understand and follow. That is the case here, this book can be used to teach students and train teachers in the valuable skill of teaching mathematics by the simple act of folding paper.

Published in "Journal of Recreational Mathematics" reprinted with permission

This is a great book to start out with, and the price is more than reasonable. The instructions for building the pieces are easy to understand. It took me less than fifteen minutes to make the piece in the bottom left corner of the cover. If you're a grade school teacher this might be a great book for an arts and crafts project. I would think that a third grader could handle several of them.

The Beginner's Book of Modular Origami Polyhedra was my introduction to the wonderful world of origami polyhedra. It gives helpful background info on the platonic solids, and features a few models in the shape of each. Unfortunatly, the book doesn't really have the best diagrams, some of the models are pretty advanced (though mostly because of the bad diagrams), and a couple of the models are just the same modules put in each section. The only problem with having the same modules is that you don't have diagrams for how to put together some of the larger polyhedra. The book still keeps me entertained, and the models look amazing on my bookshelves. Hopefully the author will publish more books on the other polyhedra out there.

This book would be a whole lot better if the diagrams were better than just black & white lines without any shading or anything to show dimension... You need to know what you're doing to figure out how to make the items in this book.

Although the content is great, I wish there were full-color diagrams and pictures inside. My 10 year old son loves it!

The cube's in the book are easy. The dodecahedron's were fairly easy too, the folds are very basic...it is a bit harder to assemble them. The only thing that is color is the cover of the book...the diagrams inside are black and white...I find myself referring back to the cover of the book to see if I can figure how it goes together. The full price of the book is $6.95. It may keep my attention for a month or so...if you use 6" x 6" paper the geometric shapes are pretty huge...to make it a bit more difficult, I tried using smaller paper.