Maths is beautiful

A bar somewhere in Scotland at the end of the second sunny day of the year. A group of teachers round the table.

Stephanie pushed the Guardian newspaper across the table. “Have you seen this today?” she asked, excitement in her voice. Dot scanned the article and then sighed.

“The ten greatest mathematicians? There's something wrong with me. I just can't get excited about the achievements of these apparently great minds. Look at this one – guy called Tao gets a prize for finding out that you can find sequences of primes of any length in which every number in the sequence is a fixed distance apart. Um. Good.” It was clear that she was seriously underwhelmed.


“If we forget that maths underpins science, nature and the whole world we live in, we'll be in trouble. It's all exciting!” suggested Stephanie, while Nick spluttered and banged his glass down on the table, almost spilling the contents.

“Are you kidding? Euler and Gauss must be two of the greatest ever minds in history!” he said loudly.

Dot looked incredulous. “So tell me something they found out that will excite me,” she challenged.

Nick picked up the paper, gesticulating wildly as he talked “Gauss gave us the basis for models of how the universe works from the petals on a flower to variations in star cluster to finance. Euler, complex numbers, without which no electronics nor even a.c. power. His maths give you the light you read by. He discovered the square root of negative numbers, Gauss, curved space-time - both new dimensions - literally - of thought.”

He looked around the table. “A fine argument, well made,” said Stephanie with an admiring smile. Robert sitting sleepily in the corner raised his glass in approval.

Dot raised her own glass and one eyebrow “Good with the light thing - that's persuasive. Square root of negative numbers though. Why would that affect me?”

Stephanie nodded “You make a fair point - it's our biggest barrier to teaching and learning sometimes…but Miss, Whyyyyy? Have a look at this video as a start” She scribbled down a web address.

Nick searched for an apt analogy “It's like when your language isn't enough to express an idea, so you resort to painting and music to make your point.”

Robert stirred once more. He swirled his whisky gently round the glass, and spoke with reverence. “It's more than just important. It's… beautiful.”

Dot nodded vigorously “I liked that and I can understand that analogy, Nick. I wish,” she added wistfully, “I wish I could see numbers as beautiful.”

Kenny leaned over from the next table “I'm with Dot on the maths. I once watched a programme though about a guy who could remember pi by visualising it as a landscape…”

Nick looked sympathetic “Dot, you don't need to have all the maths to get it: just listen to people who have the math and the passion like Richard Feynman.”

The musician who’d been playing soothing airs in the corner put down his fiddle and joined them. “JS Bach did,” he said simply.

Dot looked doubtful. “JS Bach created some music that stirs the soul. Numbers themselves don't do that.”

“It's not the numbers, so much.” Nick waved his arms again. “It's the beauty of the universe. When you get it, even the striking of a match is an amazing thing...”

The violin player continued “Bach’s music was maths and maths is music. Literally.”

Dot was not convinced. “Some of it is, Gordon yes. But not the best stuff.”

Gordon pointed to the strings on his violin “Music is sound waves and frequencies. Chords are combinations of these and so on.”

Nick nodded vigorously “The relationships are the textures and the rhythm of the music. The numbers are the score on the page.”

Dot frowned “But I don't need to know that in order to create beautiful sounds, or an emotional response. Maybe maths describes phenomena in a way that appeals to one kind of mind?” she suggested

Nick nodded again “I think it adds depth of understanding. Feynman again, asserting that the scientist can appreciate a flower no less than an artist.

Dot couldn’t help pointing out glumly “The "maths" we do in school isn't like this though.”

Nick grimaced. “It is when I do it,” he asserted. “A suggestion for your kids is to get them solving puzzles: shapes, patterns, connecting ideas, words, sequences. For fun. That’s maths”

Dot smiled. “I understand that maths learning is not linear, so would you say that playing with numbers is as important as playing with language?”

Nick responded, “Both are symbols of something else. Connections and connectedness. That's not just maths, that's knowledge.”

With this profound thought, we leave them and ponder how to reconcile this inspiring and lively concept of maths with the pressures of everyday teaching, and the HMIE requirement for evidence of pace and challenge through test results.

Of course this conversation could not really have taken place in one cosy bar, as Stephanie is in Thurso, Nick is in Edinburgh, Gordon the violin player and Kenny are in Glasgow, Robert (who had his mandolin beside him but was too tired to play it) is in North Berwick and Dot is in the Scottish Borders. North, South, East and West mean nothing to Twitter however, and 140 characters mean everything.

Thanks to @sdisbury (Stephanie), @cullaloe (Nick), @gbrown057 (Gordon), @Kenny73 (Kenny), @jonesieboy (Robert)

Engaging? Personalised? Relevant?

And back to the real world.

This sort of sheet is what my Head Teacher wants me to provide for "spelling homework" in P3 on a weekly basis next term. She is responding to what she perceives to be parental demand.

I am calling it homechores.

I should say that below is the sort of online spelling activity task they could have done last term (and actually still can since I've set it up with all the patterns we'll be learning up till December.)


or this:

Gregmeet

I spent 2 hours (of my holiday) yesterday joining a Flashmeeting, supplemented by tweets from those in the meeting room itself, linked to a presentation at LTS by Greg Whitby.

Although my webcam normally works perfectly well, on this occasion, presumably in honour of Greg’s origins, it chose to transmit my picture upside down. And perhaps this was appropriate in more than that respect, for Greg is someone who would like to turn much of our thinking about school, and learning and teaching on its head.

His website tells me that: “Greg Whitby is the Executive Director of Schools and leads a system of approximately 80 Catholic schools serving the Catholic community of greater Western Sydney. He has 30 years combined experience in K-12 schooling and senior system leadership.

In recognising the critical link between good teaching practice and student learning outcomes, Greg is working to build the capacity of school leaders and teachers through a whole-of-system approach to professional learning.

As a regular speaker at national and international conferences, Greg talks about the key areas underpinning a new model of schooling for today’s world: de-privatising teacher practice, personalising student learning and ICTs as enablers to facilitate deep learning.

In 2007, he was named the most innovative educator in Australia by the Bulletin Magazine in its annual SMART 100 awards. Greg has also been awarded an ACEL Presidential Citation for his contribution to Australian education."

An impressive CV, and he is also an inspiring and stimulating speaker of sufficient stature to have his feet firmly on the ground, whilst describing his elevated view of the road ahead. Already I’ve read some excellent blogposts about the talk, (eg Neil's, Ollie's) and look forward to reading more. I can’t summarise the whole talk, so here are just some of the ideas Greg described that struck me most powerfully.

First would have to be his definition of personalisation of learning. Personalisation, he said, does not mean individual learning programmes for each child. Instead it means having “a deep understanding of both depth and breadth, creating continuous rich learning opportunities that are real and of their world not apart from their world.” Hurrah! I wishhe’d come and speak to some of the parents in my school though.

He talked also about his strategy of having one hundred 5-year olds in one room, alarming parents, but finding favour with the teachers who tried it. The atmosphere in the room is purposeful and the children are engaged appropriately. In the teacher prep area they have a 100-square and anyone who has contact with a child writes a note on a post-it and puts it on the board on the child’s square. Teachers can then see patterns and plan. Simple but effective.

I liked his idea of developing a “learning story” for an individual child in the class. A nice way to talk about progression and one I think I will work on with the children in my class next week. At the moment they have “achievement books” they brought with them from their previous class, which they like. But the learning story idea would give more emphasis to the continuous, developing nature of what they are doing every day. How to make this relevant for all of them, and not a writing exercise? What about a diary room a la big brother? How can I set this up? Would I need video? Could they use the little TTS microphone? or Voicethread maybe?

It reassures me that, even after all these years, I still feel excitement when I hear a speaker whose words immediately point me to ways to make my teaching, and more importantly the children’s learning more effective. That’s what the best CPD does, doesn’t it?

You can watch the whole presentation on the Flashmeeting replay here.

Pentatonic playfulness

Thanks to Nick Hood aka Cullaloe for the link to this fascinating audience participation clip.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ne6tB2KiZuk

The audience has no difficulty in knowing exactly which note to sing, even when he extends the range below and above what he has sung to them, and adds his own harmonic patterns. Amazing!

The glistening trail of snail mail

What a lovely surprise!

It was our 30th wedding anniversary and our 4 children collaborated to give us a card signed by all of them!

After a week of concentrated focus here and having used digital technology extensively to collaborate, it's a timely reminder of how satisfying it is to receive a personal communication which took a lot more effort to make.

The stamps on the envelope trace its journey from New Zealand, to Iceland, to Edinburgh and finally to Peebles.

And tomorrow they have arranged for us to go to Stobo Castle for a relaxing afternoon, including a massage. Bliss! and just what we both need...

They are a lovely lot.

Meme power

Jenny, the daughter in iceland, sent me the link to this video which is very relaxing as well as totally amazing.
http://www.vimeo.com/5606758
What's also amazing is how the viewing stats rocket from 7K to 74K in 6 days!

I know it has to happen, but it would be at the very time I wanted Glow to be available!

Another cool tool

Thanks once again to Ollie for the link to this cool tool. I could have done with this at the end of term when I was putting together lots and lots of photos for the end of term slide show. I'll pass it on to the next year's teacher of this lot, and she can maybe use it as a wallpaper on the kids desktop. Once it's downloaded (I needed to register with the Microsoft Innovative Teachers Network first and then download a Microsoft NET package) it's a really simple app to use, and the result is very pleasing. The one here has 50 photos of our fabulous Laughter Yoga session. I'll certainly be using it at school and passing the details on to colleagues.

Using YouTube in school

I read Ollie's post and thought how lucky we are that ours is an enlightened Authority which does not filter youtube in our schools. I thought I'd list some of the clips that I can remember using which have enhanced my teaching and the learning of my pupils, colleagues and parents. I think I probably used others as well but I can't now remember.

Visually impaired person reading braille
BSL demos
The Mask intro stimulus for National Assessment in Writing
Our Only One World
Scottish ospreys
Irish Jig Extravaganza
Shift Happens
Olympic clips
Tom Lehrer new maths clip
Ma and Pa Kettle doing Maths

More of a wisp of smoke

My experience of glow today :-(

Goodbye Mr Apple

I've just finished talking to my daughter Sarah who's got only 3 more days in Hawke's Bay before they move down to Queenstown. They've had a great time so far touring and applepicking for Mr Apple and his friends, and discovering that some farmers can try to take advantage of casual workers. But it's a tougher proposition when it's a Scottish casual worker with a charming smile and a determination to get what's fairly due to her :-)
MSN + webcam is really good - she can talk to several of us at once and it's good to see her looking bright, happy and beautiful.

Communications

Communicating with some parents seems to be much harder than you’d expect. You’d think we’d all know that we are on the same side and that we all have the child’s best interests at heart. You’d think that last would be a given. But no.

Our homework approach has been changed recently to reflect the principles of A Curriculum for Excellence, and to acknowledge the changing expectations of the future world our children will work, create and play in. Before we changed, we consulted parents and children, we looked at research and we developed the new approach to give parents more flexibility and opportunity to be as involved as they wished, and to give children more involvement in their own learning. More specifically, we have changed the approach to home learning in reading, spelling and maths.

We are giving the children more choice about the book they take to read at home, and giving the parents more choice about what they do with it at home eg parents now decide whether and how much their child is to write in a reading diary. The emphasis however is on reading for enjoyment, and extending the range of texts they choose.

Instead of dishing out weekly spelling words 10 at a time, we use the Highland Literacy approach and give parents all the words for the stage at the beginning of the session, with a list of websites and games they might like to play together to reinforce the words.

Instead of tedious and repetitive worksheets, we decided to collect a stock of appropriately levelled Maths games for children to play at home. (The preparation of this was expensive, time-consuming and labour intensive and could not be done by support staff as each game had to be evaluated for its suitability both in maths and in reading level for age and stage, and then bagged with labels and counters, dice, cards, etc. )

Our home links with topic work are often through personal projects on an aspect of the topic, and suggestions for local visits, websites and other links are included in PLPs.


When I was a parent of primary children, I would have been delighted with this approach, giving me much more flexibility and enjoyment in sharing learning with my children. I would have welcomed the removal of the pressure of artificial deadlines, and would have been pleased that my children’s teachers were spending more time teaching my children and less in preparation and marking of paper exercises of extremely dubious value.

But parents at my school? No. A vocal few want a return to the teacher setting the reading book and the number of pages to be read (“Because the children won’t do it unless the teacher has said they must.”) They want 10 spelling words issued on a Monday to be tested on Friday and the results posted on a noticeboard. (“So motivating”) They will accept Maths games as homework, so long as traditional worksheet homework is also supplied, set, marked and returned by the teacher. (“Lets parents know where the children are in their learning”) Oh, and a weekly report on each child’s progress…

We thought it would be good to have some information evenings to let parents know how we teach things these days. We thought we’d start with Maths – the teaching of which has probably changed most since these parents were at school themselves. We imagined an evening of 15-minute workshops on things such as place value, processes of addition, smartboard games, how we teach fractions - the things parents have told us at parents evenings that they would like to be better informed about.

So the self-selected subgroup of the parent council was asked to find out from parents what specific topics would be most helpful. Disappointingly, they seem to want “monitoring and assessment” and “how you stretch the most able and support the less able” - the sort of areas we’d expect HMIe with some professional knowledge to consider. It’s hard to see this as anything other than these parents’ distrust of our professionalism.

These are the parents who say things like “I want my daughter to know she can do anything she wants.” We nod. “If she wants to get to Cambridge she will have to be pushed.” We stop nodding. “It’s so important therefore for her to be given the structured homework that will ensure that she can achieve this.” Internally we shake our heads sadly, knowing that this 10-year old would be much better served by being taught some self-motivation, some social skills and given some opportunity to have fun – real fun, as opposed to scheduled activities.

As a result of this pressure, I have seen excellent teachers in our school questioning themselves, their effectiveness and their abilities. Some of the most committed and creative individuals I know have been needlessly pushed to the point of wondering if they are in the right job. We all know it’s good to question our practice, and are always open to the possibility of change as a result of our reflections. We constantly evaluate what we do, and have “I want to make a difference to each child” stamped to the core of what we are. With all our hearts, we would like each child to be given all of our time and focus, and for each lesson to go according to plan.

Working one to one, or in very small groups, at a time and in a place that is conducive to learning, (as parents have the opportunity to do with their children) would allow each child to make maximum progress of a sort. But the real world isn’t like that. Even if, usually, teaching time is protected, there will always be those days when we have to interrupt the teaching of our exciting and interactive lesson on remainders to explain briefly to Keira why it wasn’t nice or necessary to make Lee cry about the fact that his Dad’s now living with Danielle’s Mum and their new baby, and to ask Jordan to give Hannah’s new glitter pen back, (yes it is Hannah’s; yes, it really is; no that word isn’t acceptable in school, nor is throwing a pen at Hannah; yes you did, I saw you…) and to let the P7 eco reps talk to the class about what the theme will be at next month’s fundraiser. This is reality. It is not helpful to pretend it is otherwise, but it can make us feel guilty that we didn’t “get through” as much as we’d hoped, or don’t manage to give full attention to every one of the 30 children, every day.

And when faced with sometimes quite aggressively expressed negative comments from just a few parents, it can be hard to remember the many parents who said at parents evening how much they appreciate the skill and commitment of the teacher of their child and, since the new approach to home learning, how much more they are enjoying all aspects of their child’s learning, and how much more valued they feel as contributors to and partners in their children’s learning.

Sink or swim?

Recently things have been rather hectic. There have been times when, I must admit, I’ve considered the possibility that I might have taken on too much. Mostly other people’s responses – “I don’t know how you do it!” – “Where do you get the time?” give me a sense of achievement, and so far I haven’t had to cope with a “Why didn’t you…” or “You’ve let me down” although there have been things that just haven’t made it to my priority list.

I am a fairly organised person (though this definitely does not apply to my domestic duties) and would normally get things done in advance of their deadline. Recently however, things stacked up rather, and I have been forced to cut it fine on several projects. This “just in time” approach is the way that my Head Teacher usually chooses to work.

Previously I had observed that it put rather a strain on other people, who would often have to drop what they were doing in order to ensure that our HT’s higher priority activity happened. I sometimes thought of this as unfair and stressful for the others involved. However this last week has engendered much “team spirit” and a sense of community as we all worked hard and with common goals right up to the wire on such events as the highly successful Burns Supper, and the warm and appreciative gatherings of pupils and parents, and then later present and former staff to mark our long-serving and much-loved janitor’s retiral.

I have some fairly important and stressful events to organise in the coming weeks, some of which will require nerves of steel. Perhaps I should look on them as opportunities for “just in time” practice which will build a sense of community. Perhaps I should look to involve others more, rather than do it all myself. I don’t know what happens if you do sail too close to the wind. I suppose I might capsize, but I can swim. There are usually lifeboats around waiting for just such a call. It’s risky but I might give it a go.

Dr Kawashima

Ha! My brain is getting younger, even if my body isn't.

I've just taken part in a weekend of music making. We were studying Mahler's 1st Symphony (this isn't us!) a work of some difficulty for all, especially us first violins, and I could have done with weeks not hours to get to grips with the notes.

Our conductor was Garry Walker, a gentleman of prodigious talent, both in musical terms and people skills. Starting from a pretty low base, he persuaded a large group of people to perform at ever greater levels of musicality, insisting on listening to each other and fitting in.

The people I sat beside were a delight. Because of the business of our lives, the three of us attended all the rehearsals between us, but not all at the same time until the final one this afternoon, so I had the opportunity to benefit from the eoncouragement of 2 very good players, who both tolerated with good humour and patience, my attempts to render accurately Mahler's quavers in the upper register, helping me with fingerings and so on.

I don't know how else you could recreate the sheer joy and elation, when after the violent storm of the last movement, we turned to the final page and suddenly, at the glorious climax, the sun actually came streaming through the windows bathing everyone in a golden glow.

Precious moments.

New Year Brain Age

I'm quite pleased about this for three reasons. Obviously this score is pleasing for someone with a 52 year old brain. But also I'm ploeased because I've never used a Nintendo before. When the children had Game boys I could never get enough motivation to learn how to do any of their games.

So not only have I improved from my initial age of 72 (!!) on the first day, I have also learned some new technology with relative ease.

And the third reason? I gave the thing to Mr C for his Christmas, and couldn't get it off him to play with it myself until this week - that's what I call a successful Christmas toy :-)

Hakuna matata

Sometimes I just hate this Mum business.

So the last time I heard from Sarah - she's gone to New Zealand, remember - was Tuesday. Since then I've texted her, phoned her, got her voicemail and left a message, and found out by phoning the very helpful NZ flower shop lady that her Christmas parcel was delivered, but left at the door without getting a signature. But I haven't heard from her since Tuesday.

Should I worry? Clearly. I am her mother after all and I'll do that anyway.

Should I do anything about my worry? If so what? I have no other way of getting in touch apart from something quite extreme like the police. It's a very uncomfortable feeling.

Update: I've now phoned the police in Napier as I've still heard nothing from Sarah, and her phone goes straight to voicemail. Just waiting now.'

Further update: She phoned at 5am this morning to say they'd been on a four day hike and got out of signal range before they realised it. She was embarrassed to find they had attracted the attention of the police and consequently their neighbours. Next time she'll tell someone where she's going. Phew!

image: http://www.cambridgegreekcorner.co.uk/productslink.html

Preparing for Christmas on the beach?

I think she's enjoying herself. She and Tomas arrived in Auckland, bought a car, travelled to Napier and are renting a flat. They've done a lot of sightseeing already and sound very happy.

Christmas Greetings!

Health in the Eye of the Storm

Today we had an unusual In-Service day. Under the banner of Health and Wellbeing, our cluster, teachers, support staff and office staff, was treated to a whole day with a broad programme of workshops from salsa to pilates, well woman/man to meditation. (We had previously made a choice of 8 from which we were allocated to 4.) We were given a healthy and appetising lunch and given time to browse a "market place" of health promoting stalls.

The keynote speaker, Andy McKechnie was very entertaining as well as motivating.

I feel energised by the sessions I attended: salsa, posture and fitness, massage and "health in the eye of the storm". I had my cholesterol and blood pressure properly checked by a doctor at the drop-in (both reassuringly fine) and had a brief but very helpful chat with her.

I am hopeful. This is a new approach for our target-driven hierarchy, supporting with action the idea that treating people as people instead of numbers or statistics will benefit everyone. Don Ledingham, Director of a neighbouring Authority has written about his take on mental health and wellbeing. Our own Director spoke in a very personal way about managing stress and the importance of balance. I remembered Ian Smith of Learning Unlimited at SLF08 saying that a teacher needs the skills of a tightrope walker - not, as you might think, safely balanced, but being able to cope with being a bit off balance.

And it's interesting to observe the positive effect of finishing at 3.15, chatting with other teachers who had enjoyed the day, and no tedious plenary to sit through at the end.

Roll call

Alan’s blogpost ps about words brought to mind an entertaining diversion we indulged in at orchestra rehearsal one night.

The conductor raised his baton and we suddenly realised that crucial players had still to come back from washing up the tea cups.So we noted an an absence of bassoons...and while we waited, began devising group names for some of our comrades-at-arms. Those I can remember were:

an arrogance of first violins

a fluster of second violins

an enclosure of violas

an ostentation of cellos

a struggle of double basses

an outcry of oboes

What I wonder is the group name for Bloggers? Quite a few blogs consider this. This blog list of other collective nouns and also suggests a” of bloggers. And this one has assembled many suggestions including a "roll"

Maybe though it should be a solitude of bloggers reflecting the individual and yet communal nature of blogging?