Kingston Counts! A Celebration of Family Math

Kingston Counts! A Celebration of Family Math, which took place in April, 2010, was the inagural event of the Community Outreach Centre.  The event offered 25 teaching centres at which parents, grandparents, caregivers and children engaged with unique and fun-filled, yet substantive mathematics activities.

At each station, children were involved in a ‘make-and-take’ mathematics-based craft activity. This provided families with opportunities to make a simple soroban (a Japanese abacus), an origami cube, a tangram flag, a cipher wheel, a combinations and permutations flip book, and a magic (anamorphic) mirror and anamorphic drawing.

In addition to the ‘hands-on, heads-in’ interactive learning stations that addressed all five content strands and all process strands from the Ontario Mathematics Curriculum, families were treated to the ‘world premiere’ of a puppet play, Mathakazam! based on an original concept by Lynda Colgan and produced by Annie Milne of Gentlewings Puppet Troupe.

• Mathekazam Video

All puppets were created by Faculty of Education teacher candidates under Annie's mentorship. The teacher candidates performed the play and collaborated in the composition of the Mathakazam! song and choreography of its simple dance—performed by the puppeteers and audience members at the play's conclusion. 

At the close of the event, each family received a family math take-home kit to support mathematics learning beyond the day. The kit included a book containing simple ‘kitchen-table math activities;’ a list of children’s books with a mathematics theme that are available through local, public libraries; recommended websites for mathematics games and support; and suggestions for ways to support mathematics learning in informal ways. All activities in the book were researched, compiled, field-tested and desk-top published by the teacher candidates who comprised the Kingston Counts! team.

Kingston Counts! was organized by a team of 16 teacher candidates, under the direction of Dr. Lynda Colgan, and it provided them with a unique opportunity to become certified Family Math facilitators and to experience the important role that public education should play in the life of any educator and any school or research institution.