For Fred Harwood, who taught mathematics at McRoberts secondary for 22 years before retiring in 2014, retirement meant a second master’s degree in education, with a focus on numeracy. Part of his research involved visiting elementary schools and examining how mathematics is understood and taught. And those visits inspired him to create a math club at Diefenbaker elementary with teachers Cori Anderson and Ingrid Veilleux.
The weekly, hour-long session attracts about 10 students, most of them in Grades 6 and 7.
“The club’s popularity and existence shows there’s an appetite for enriched mathematics in a fun and challenging atmosphere beyond the classroom,” said Anderson.
It’s an important opportunity for students after the Math Circle, an online math enrichment program previously available to gifted mathematics students, was shut down due to budget constraints in the school district.
Harwood said the Diefenbaker Math Club’s objective is to provide enrichment opportunities for students who are interested in math. “We’ve been working on visualization of math, patterns and generalizing patterns, and the last few weeks we’ve been working in bases other than base 10, i.e. base two and three,” he explained. “That’s recreating mathematics but with a whole new number system, and it gives students the opportunity to think more deeply about basic math.”
Most of the attendees are good at math, he conceded. But being a gifted mathematician is not a prerequisite to joining the club.
For Anderson and Veilleux, the club offers a form of professional development. “We get lots of ideas that we can take back to our classrooms,” Anderson said. For Harwood, it’s an opportunity to give back — even after 22 years of giving in the classroom. “I learn, and the kids are always excited by it. Plus, it’s a mentoring opportunity for me to mentor the teachers teaching the club. It helps them to understand different ways of thinking about math.”
Angela Pan, a Grade 7 student at Diefenbaker, said she likes the math questions posed in the club. “They’re more difficult and require you to think more about them,” she reflected. “I’ve learned binary, patterns and algebraic expressions, and I love how you have to think to solve the problems, and that there’s mostly always an answer.”
Fellow math club member Victor Lim, also in Grade 7, said he attends because he wants to challenge himself in math.
“I’ve learned about binaries and pi, and how to show my work in different ways,” he said. “Mr. Harwood lets you walk through the problems and once you get to a certain point, you understand how it all works.”
