School maths – but not as Mum and Dad remember

MEDIA RELEASE - www.mathsweek.org.nz

It’s school maths – but not as Mum and Dad remember!

One third of all New Zealand schools are registered to log into just one web site today for the start of ANZ Maths Week 2006. (August 14 – 18)

www.mathsweek.org.nz goes live today (August 14) and competitions on it will be open for just five days. ANZ Maths Week is the brainchild of the New Zealand Association of Mathematics Teachers and aims to get NZ kids excited about the numbers in their lives.

NZAMT president, Alan Parris, says thousands more students are expected to log on as the week progresses.

“It’s a fun cyper space and puts together unlikely ideas. Players use an animated goat to catch money as fast as they can. Or they try to get the goat across a canyon. There are electronic jigsaw puzzles and live auctions and world travel races.”

Mr Parris says the site will be used by teachers in class time and to provide homework. “It also works for home schooling and parents.”

“This is a one week long event. It’s a huge planning exercise for just one week, but that’s what the kids love – for just five days there’s a batch of fresh, exciting online maths games and a whole lot of classroom challenges and puzzles. Students get a chance to pitch their skills against everyone else studying maths at their level in NZ. The top 100 scores achieved each day are published and competition to be top of the table is fierce.”

“Players also get to convert their scores into maths week dollars and bid for prizes in live on line auctions. It’s a really fun way to do maths – whether it’s your best subject or your greatest challenge,” he says. Mr Parris says because young people are technology savvy, it makes sense to introduce the abstract thinking skills of maths with leading edge technology.

ENDS

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