How to make a mandala

Mandalas are calming, inspiring and symmetrical. Learning about mandalas will give your kids a sense of the links between cultures and our common humanity. To illustrate this it would be good to have mandalas from various cultures in the house.

When your kid gets to middle school age, mandalas can be used to teach them about symmetry. Bilateral (or mirror) symmetry and rotational symmetry. Do make sure to included mandalas with other than 90 degrees rotational symmetry, for instance 120 degrees or 72 (in threes or fives respectively). Some mandala books include mandalas that aren't symmetrical at all - which makes a good trick question: what symmetry is there in this mandala?

Once the basis is understood you can go on to the colored mandalas and get the kids wondering whether those are still symmetrical... Were they colored symmetrically?

Coloring mandalas can be great fun. But to get kids thinking about it a bit more, give them access to various forms of mandalas and let them think about the symbolism of them, the color use in various traditions and so on.

Watch the videos together and ask questions about them. What is the role of the music? Why are the sand mandalas destroyed afterwards?

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Katinka Hesselink has been fascinated with religion for as long as she can remember. She started studying theosophy and the world religions in earnest when she was 19. She loves reading books about any and all the spiritual traditions, and reviews them online.

She even did a stint of university studying World Religion, specializing in Buddhism and Indian religions.

She has gathered inspiring quotes and informative articles on Buddhism, Sufism, Mystic Christianity and of course theosophy on her website Katinka Hesselink Net. On her popular spiritual blog All Considering she shares her knowledge, experiences and thoughts on spiritual topics.