Weaving patterns

In your book, Maths Mela (Chapter 7, Shapes and Patterns), we weave mats with paper strips, just like woven baskets. You need a coloured paper 30 cm long and 20 cm wide, and eight paper strips of two different colours, each 3 cm wide. Fold the paper, cut slits in it, and open it out. Then weave the strips across the slits.

The first strip goes 1 under, 1 over, 1 under, 1 over, again and again, to the end of the row. The second strip, in the other colour, does the opposite: 1 over, 1 under, 1 over, 1 under. Where the first strip went under, the second goes over. All the strips are woven in this same alternating way, so the third row is like the first, and the fourth row is like the second.

We can write the weave as a rule for each row. Row 1: 1 under, 1 over, … (repeat). Row 2: 1 over, 1 under, … (repeat). A rule lets anyone make the same mat.

The book shows another mat. Row 1: 2 over, 1 under, 2 over, 1 under, … Row 2: 2 under, 1 over, 2 under, 1 over, … Again row 2 is the opposite of row 1: every 'over' becomes 'under' and every 'under' becomes 'over'.