A Magical & Radical Approach to Math Education  

Queen’s Faculty of Education Celebrates Launch of New Children’s Book and TV Series 

Stephen Elliott, Dean of the Faculty of Education, is pleased to invite you to join us in celebrating the publication of Lynda Colgan's new book Mathemagic and the upcoming TV series The Prime Radicals.   The launch will take place in the Education Library at Duncan McArthur Hall from 4:00-6:00 pm on January 13th. The author will perform tricks from her book and there will be a preview of episodes from the TV series. Refreshments will be provided and mathemagicians of all ages are welcome.

Colgan takes a magical and radical approach to math education that keeps children entertained and makes negative attitudes towards learning disappear into thin air. Her new book Mathemagic will amaze students, parents and teachers with its number tricks, magic words, props and tips. The Prime Radicals, a live-action television series with scenarios showing how math is used for everything from clubhouse renovations to cooking, will also make numbers cool for kids.

Based on Colgan's Kingston Whig-Standard newspaper columns, Mathemagic and The Prime Radicals meet the need for a fresh approach to math education. One of Colgan's newspaper readers wrote: "I hardly ever passed a mathematics exam in school. But Lynda Colgan's exploration of the world of mathematics has transformed my years of ignorance and anxiety into appreciation and wonder... When her book comes out - there has to be a book - Lynda Colgan may well be known as the ‘Wizard of Kingston'."

Not only did she respond with a book published by Kids Can Press, which will be available this March, the "Wizard of Kingston" had another trick up her sleeve. She cast a spell by developing The Prime Radicals in collaboration with Executive Producer Hoda Elatawi, General Assembly Production Centre (Ottawa). The magic potion was produced in association with TVOntario, Knowledge Network, SCN and ACCESS Alberta, and with the financial participation of the Canada Media Fund, The Shaw Rocket Fund, the Bell Broadcast and New Media Fund, and the Ontario Media Development Corporation. The series is premiering on TVO at 3:30 pm on January 15th, and it will magically appear on education stations in British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba.

As the book and TV series are correlated to the Ontario mathematics curriculum and are complemented and supplemented by ancillary activities on a companion website, they are clearly of interest to teachers. A secondary goal is to engage parents and other adults in complementary "kitchen table" mathematics. By inviting both children and adults into a world of incidental learning, Colgan is creating a community of mathematics learners of many ages that supports and extends the teaching that occurs in schools.

Lynda Colgan's career as a mathematics educator began more than 30 years ago and, since then, her roles have been many: classroom teacher; consultant; researcher; professor; newspaper columnist; book author; and collaborator on The Prime Radicals. As Coordinator of the Faculty of Education Community Outreach Centre, Colgan focuses on public education and unlocking the magic of math for learners of all ages.

If you would like to attend the launch or receive more information, please contact Vicky Arnold at the Queen‘s Faculty of Education at 613-533-6000 ext 75791 or arnoldv@queensu.ca.