FunMaths Roadshow: UK-wide Roll-out

FunMaths路演是一项亲身实践的数学活动，由利物浦数学协会拥有，该协会是由学校教师、学生和大学工作人员几年来开发的。它包括在A3卡上制作的吸引人的活动，外加一些简单的配套设备。这些活动被收集到“盒子”中，每个盒子包含25个活动，每个盒子针对特定的年龄段。各年级、小学、中学及中六年级的学生均可选择合适的教材，而教材所涉及的数学概念范围亦十分广泛。路演面向各种能力的孩子，并已在各类学校成功举办。卡片通常放在小桌子上，由大约50名儿童组成的班级以小组形式处理这些活动，相互谈论数学知识，并致力于解决问题。帮助者可以是老师、年龄较大的学生、大学生或工作人员，他们会根据需要谨慎地提供帮助，并判断找到的解决方案是否正确。每个小组都有一张表，记录他们成功解决了哪些问题。这项活动互动性很强，当帮助者是年龄较大的学生时，效果特别好，有时是中学生帮助那些来自支线小学的学生。在过去的几年里，全国数以万计的学生从路演中受益；仅2007年5月《教师》杂志上的一篇文章就在全国范围内产生了100多个参观请求。这些问题的文本(总共300多个)也以CD的形式由利物浦数学学会出售。路演是STEM目录中的特色活动。路演活动有时伴随着更集中的研讨会。这些都是结构化的问题集，附带一个专门针对单个主题的交互式演示文稿。它们鼓励学生探索与他们的学校学习有关的数学方面，但指向更先进的思想。工作坊的目标对象通常是更有能力获得普通中等教育证书的学生，以及六年级学生。所有的研讨会都在非常成功的利物浦大学数学俱乐部进行试验，该俱乐部吸引了30-40名热情的年轻人，通常年龄在13-18岁之间，每个学年的一个星期六。其他几个组织，如国家数学卓越教学中心(NCETM)，进一步数学网络和皇家学会(Ri)，都热情地在自己的活动中采用路演材料。在英国文化协会的帮助下，这些材料已经翻译了几次，活动在法国成功举办。活动可以涉及公众，就像一年一度的科学节一样。路演的成功使利物浦的一个中心在举办活动方面提供全国性服务是不可行的。该提案寻求通过一系列枢纽在全国范围内推广路演和相应的研讨会。已经有几个迹象表明，对运营这些枢纽有浓厚的兴趣。一个非常重要的特点是，一旦建立，预计这些中心将变得自给自足，使用当地资金、学校付款或(与谢菲尔德现有的一个中心一样)专门的教师时间。目前以个人防护津贴受聘的外展主任和一名助理将继续受聘两年，以指导这些中心的建立，并在路演中提供初步帮助。路演材料和研讨会的其他开发也在计划中，在已经讨论的基础上增加了更多的主题，这些主题也在数学俱乐部进行了试验。

The FunMaths Roadshow is a hands-on mathematical activity, owned by the Liverpool Mathematical Society, which has been developed over several years by schoolteachers, students and university staff. It consists of activities, attractively produced on laminated A3 cards, plus some simple accompanying equipment. The activities are collected into 'Boxes', each Box containing 25 activities and each Box being aimed at a particular age-group. There is appropriate material for school pupils from all years, Primary, Secondary and Sixth Form and the range of mathematical ideas which feed into the material is very wide. The Roadshow is aimed at children of all abilities, and has been successfully run in all kinds of schools. The cards are typically set up on small tables and classes of about 50 children tackle the activities in small groups, talking to each other about the mathematics and working towards a solution. Helpers, who can be teachers, older pupils, university students or staff, give discreet assistance as needed and judge whether the solutions found are correct. Each group has a sheet to record which problems they have successfully solved. The activity is highly interactive, and works especially well when the helpers are older pupils, sometimes secondary school pupils helping those from feeder primary schools. Tens of thousands of pupils all over the country have benefitted from the Roadshow over the last few years; an article in 'Teachers' magazine in May 2007 alone produced over a hundred requests for visits nationwide. The texts of the problems (over 300 in all) are also sold as a CD by the Liverpool Mathematical Society. The Roadshow is featured in the STEM directory.Roadshow events are sometimes accompanied by more concentrated Workshops. These are structured sets of problems, with an accompanying interactive presentation, devoted to a single topic. They encourage pupils to explore an aspect of mathematics which is related to their school studies but points towards more advanced ideas. Workshops are typically aimed at more able pupils of GCSE attainment, and sixth formers. All Workshops are trialled at the highly successful Liverpool University Maths Club, which attracts 30-40 enthusiastic youngsters usually aged 13-18, one Saturday per month during the school year.Several other organizations such as the National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics (NCETM), the Further Maths Network and the Royal Institution (Ri) have enthusiastically adopted Roadshow materials for their own events. Several translations of the materials have been made and events run successfully in France, aided by the British Council. Events can involve the public, as with the annual Festivals of Science.The success of the Roadshow has made it impracticable for one centre, in Liverpool, to provide a national service in running events. The proposal seeks to roll out the Roadshow and the accompanying Workshops nationally through a series of Hubs. There have already been several indications of strong interest in running these Hubs. A very important feature is that, once set up, it is expected that the Hubs will become self-sustaining, using local funding, payments from schools or (as with one existing hub, in Sheffield) dedicated teacher time. The current Outreach Officer employed on a PPE grant, and an assistant, would be employed for a further two years to guide the setting up of these hubs and provide initial help in running Roadshows. Other developments of the Roadshow materials and Workshops are also planned, adding further topics to those already covered, again trialled at the Maths Club.