- Working Like a Mathematician at Mt. Carmel
Professional Development from Mathematics Centre (PD from MC) organised by the Catholic Education Office, Canberra Goulburn Diocese, has changed the way mathematics is being learnt at Mt. Carmel Central School, Yass, New South Wales. Angela Luchetti and Monica Hay have written a brief article highlighting what has been happening. Some of the phrases they use are:
...engaged in investigations and challenges ... now used regularly in our classrooms ... students were excited ... all students experienced success...
See Link List below to find their very readable article.
- Poly Plug on NRICH
NRICH, developed by the University of Cambridge, UK, is one of the world's best mathematics education sites, so we are a just a little bit proud that there are now four new NRICH activities based on using Poly Plug.
- Each activity is supported by a Flash interactive and Teachers' Notes and one is supported by classroom video.
Lynne McClure and Liz Woodham, two of NRICH's leaders, were introduced to Poly Plug at a conference and immediately recognised its simplicity, effectiveness and flexibility. As a result NRICH has certainly enriched the store of teacher developed activities which use this classroom friendly resource. See Link List below.
- PD from MC: Working Mathematically with Infants
If you teach 5-7 year olds (K - 2), then you might be interested in our full day program Working Mathematically with Infants planned for October 21st. The day is being organised by Critical Agendas and will be held at The Centre, Ivanhoe. WMI integrates the use of Threaded Activities from Calculating Changes with whole class investigations. Poly Plug and calculators are major resources used during the day, and the conference fee includes a Poly Plug for each participant.
The workshop explores several activities and investigations, identifies teaching craft successful with infant children and explores a planning model that some report makes teaching easier and learning deeper and more fun. The flier below has all the details. At this stage there are still places available. See Link List below.
We ran this course for Critical Agendas back in August and some responses to the evaluation question 'What influence might today have on your classroom?' were:
- Certainly will try most of these appropriate to my class level.
- Where do I begin? So many terrific ideas to trial and extremely valuable information.
- Strategies, language and a range of lessons.
- Try to encourage children to act like mathematicians.
- Implementing lesson ideas into the curriculum.
- New activities.
- Update to Task 113, Calendar
Stephen Hanlon, Braemar College, Victoria, had a great time struggling with this problem in a workshop. All the while he fought the urge to go to his desk and pick up the wooden cube date blocks that were sitting there showing the answer. He solved our puzzle and checked the Cameo notes. Then he disappeared and returned with his desk top model. It offered a different and very interesting solution. A note about this intriguing solution has been added to the Extensions section of the Task Cameo.
See Link List below.
- On Matters of Proof
The concept of proof is a critical element in the work of a mathematician. From the day children enter school, if the school has learning to work like a mathematician as its core curriculum, they are sensitised and prepared for this with the mathematician's questions:
- Can I check it another way?
- What happens if...?
- How many solutions are there?
- How do you know when you have found them all?
which are documented in the Working Mathematically process.
Dr. Paul Brown, a secondary teacher from Western Australia, is passionate about appropriate, rigorous proof being included in the mathematics curriculum and offers 50 pages of proof assignments and tests free from his web site in the Downloads section. He also publishes an excellent resource book titled Proof: Interesting activities in conjecture and mathematical proof. All the activities it includes have been classroom tested, including Truth Tiles. See Link List below.
- Tasks of the Month
Two new cameos this month.
- Famous Mathematicians reminds us that including the history of mathematics in our teaching is essential. No one would expect literature learning to be divorced from the great writers of the past and present. Equally it is important to include great mathematicians of the past and present in mathematics learning. The word finder puzzle in this task is an introduction to challenges to find out more about mathematicians' lives.
- Four Bead Mix places ratio in the context of the real life imagery of a company that makes packets of mixed beads for craft shops, but wants to maintain the same ratio of beads in each packet. The task also includes basic number facts, counting patterns, factors and fractions.
 
Click a photo to access its cameo, or access all current cameos through the Link List below.
Keep smiling,
Doug.
Link List
- Did you miss August?
If so you missed information about:
- New tasks moving around the world
- Revision of Task Centre Manual
- A guidance page for working with Mathematics Centre
- Teaching craft video added to Cube Tube
- Iceberg Information about two Task of the Month
(Tasks 133, 134)
- ...and more...
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Did You Know?
- You can find tasks coded by Year Level and Curriculum Strand in the Task Centre Catalogue (PDF file).
- The Activities link of Calculating Changes offers Content Finder & Year Level Finder tools.
- Our Site Map acts as a Table of Contents to help you find what you need in Mathematics Centre.
- You can search for lessons by Year Level, Curriculum Strand, Lesson Features & Keyword at Maths300.
- You can connect Tasks to their Maths300 companion lesson using Tasks & Maths300 (a PDF file).
- All these links, and more, appear in Working with Mathematics Centre (a PDF file).
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