It's official; the Greater Nebraska Math Teachers Circle season has begun. Nearly 40 teachers gathered in Kearney before the NATM fall conference for math and munchies at the first Greater Nebraska Math Teachers Circle meeting of the year. Math Teachers Circles bring together mathematicians and teachers with the goal of providing an opportunity to discover and share with students the excitement and richness of problem solving in deep yet accessible mathematical topics.
At the NATM conference, two parallel sessions were held for teachers in order to accommodate a broad audience: secondary teachers played "Chomp the Graph" while elementary teachers pondered math problems without numbers. Everyone received a free dinner.
Primarily Math veterans Cindy Beaman and Sarah (Haynes) Timmer of Grand Island Public Schools presented "Where are the Numbers? I Thought This Was Math!" to 16 educators, mostly elementary teachers, from across the state. This was the first Math Teachers Circle event held at the NATM conference that was specifically designed for an audience of elementary teachers.
Kathy Niedbalski of Kearney Catholic High School presented "Chomp the Graph: A Mathematical Game of Strategy" to 28 other secondary teachers and educators. The idea for the topic came from Niedbalski’s master’s thesis, as she completed her MAT degree this past August. "Chomp the Graph" is a very accessible and fun game with strategies that can be analyzed and understood by students various ages.
Now more Math Teachers Circle meetings are being scheduled across Nebraska at the locations listed below. All teachers are invited! For more information and photos from the first GNMTCs of the season, visit http://scimath.unl.edu/gnmtc.
Beatrice, Falls City, Grand Island, Hebron, Holdrege, Milford, Norfolk, North Platte, Scottsbluff, Seward.
Other Math Teachers Circles in Nebraska convene regularly in Kearney, Lincoln, Omaha and Wayne.
For contact information and dates visit http://scimath.unl.edu/mathteacherscircle.
Special thanks to all who contributed to the Greater Nebraska Math Teachers Circle: The Mathematical Sciences Research Institute (MSRI) through the National Security Agency (NSA), NATM, NebraskaMATH and the Center for Science, Mathematics and Computer Education at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.