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Title of the Experience

Mathematics in the street

Name of the teacher

Bogumiła Szukalska

Country where it took place

Poland

School typology

Primary school

Thematic Area

Maths

Experience typology

Teaching in class

Type of contact

Direct

Description of the Experience

I am a teacher of mathematics in primary school, but at the same time I conduct individual classes with students in lower secondary school. It often happens that students question the sense of learning certain contents from the curricula, claim that the exercises are monotonous and not interesting. That's why I try to diversify activities to make them more attractive. We often leave the classrooms and go out to do hands-on activities. I show my students that everything that surrounds us is more or less combined with mathematics. One of many projects I carry out with my students is “maths in the street''. This project aims to link theory with the world around us. Therefore my students go out into the street and do photos of objects, where they can find perpendicularity, parallelism, symmetry, and other geometrical figures, various types of angles. Then they develop these materials with regard to theoretical knowledge, thereby perpetuate the concepts and properties that are later associated with a specific object. The materials are presented in the form of albums or multimedia presentations. Street is not only geometry, but also a place where you can do a lot of different calculations such as how many tiles are needed to create the car park or a place to perform various measurements such as what is the width of the bikepath and what part of the road it is? Being on the road one must stop at the tram stop or bus to decipher the timetable. You can take a picture, which will be helpful to plan a visit to the museum a few days later. Classes at my school allow me to do this type of work, do not restrict me to the classroom-lesson system, because my students really like this subject and see the point in learning it.

Comments on this Teachers Experience

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Date: 2014.11.09

Posted by Zuzana Kuppeova (Slovakia)

I can confirm such experiences of teaching Mathematics. Pupils are most interested in area where the learned knowledge can be used in real life. The more examples they can actually try, the more their interest in the subject increased and they will remember it for a longer time. In a similar way, "on the street", with my students I realized statistical research of the traffic situation in front of our school. During one hour, groups of students were recording different information about cars which passed the school. Students could see the use of Mathematics; they solved the statistical problems with more interest. They presented the results of research in front of other pupils from school and discussed this issue.

Date: 2014.11.09

Posted by Katarína Javorová (Slovakia)

Great idea - to take students to the city, to the streets and let them watch what objects surround us. I really like the experience; it is possible to see a lot on the street. It offers a variety of activities, ideas, covering almost the entire mathematics curriculum for elementary schools (and secondary too). Unfortunately the number of students in our classes (27-30 students), makes this activity more difficult to realize. Especially from the point of view of safety. But I will definitely try it after school within some course activities, or at least I will take pupils on the school yard or playground and realize the project. The described experience is original and has a great educative value - students learn how to observe, how to work with specialized mathematical concepts - geometric objects, mathematical operations. Using ICT, the activity is even more interesting. The activity is suitable for higher grades.

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