Learning to love math through the exploration of maypole patterns
By Julianna Campbell & Christine von Renesse
The authors explore how maypole dancing inspires liberal arts students to engage with mathematics through inquiry-based learning. This pedagogy shifts the focus from delivering information to student-driven problem-solving, where learners collaborate to develop their own conjectures and proofs. Co-author Julianna Campbell recounts her personal transformation from math anxiety to research confidence, highlighting how curiosity and perseverance enabled her to find joy in the subject.
Mathematically, the study investigates the total number of non-equivalent ribbon patterns generated by different combinations of dancers and colors. The class developed two primary models for analysis: the tree representation, which visualizes diagonal crossings on graph paper, and the screen representation, used to automate and view patterns horizontally and vertically in Excel. Patterns are classified as equivalent if they are related through rotations, translations, reflections, or color changes. The authors prove four specific theorems—Letter Rotation, Ribbon Swap, Leader Rotation, and Pair Swap—to identify these symmetries. Their findings for a six-ribbon dance identify five unique patterns using two colors, seven using three colors, and five using four colors. The research concludes by posing open problems regarding how these structures generalize to larger groups of dancers.
STOP #1:
" - Students will strengthen their reasoning skills and become better problem solvers.
- Students will strengthen their skills in reading, writing, argumentation and speaking.
- Students will strengthen their skills in reading, writing, argumentation and speaking.
[...]
- Students will improve their mathematical confidence.
- Students will improve their mathematical confidence.
- Students will develop awareness of the negative impact of broadly held societal views. " (p.132)
These goals are beautiful to say the least. These goals definitely work towards becoming more fluent in mathematics, but debatably more importantly, these goals work on create better humans and better and more confident members of our society. These goals work towards exposing students to really important topics while enhancing their math skills.
These goals are beautiful to say the least. These goals definitely work towards becoming more fluent in mathematics, but debatably more importantly, these goals work on create better humans and better and more confident members of our society. These goals work towards exposing students to really important topics while enhancing their math skills.
STOP #2: "I realize that K-12 math education failed me. I was one of millions of kids my age who had grown up to believe that math was just a formal, numeric, and logic-based subject." (p.134)
As a senior math teacher, this sentence hurts. I struggle when I hear this, as I was always a lover of math, and math always came easy to me. I got to where I am today because I purely loved the subject and always found joy in it. I see most complex math problems as puzzles, and find joy when finally finding solutions. BUT, I am 100% aware that this is not the case for most of my students. I work towards integrating more "fun" into my class, but find myself often restricted by time and the giant pile of curricular topics I need to cover before the final Ministry exam that is worth 50-100% of their year! Because the Ministry is still using a HUGE standardized test at the end of the year, we are limited as senior math teachers when going rogue and off the "traditional trail". As much as we don't want to admit it, we are kind of "teaching to the test" and need to be cautious of potential "wasted time" because we are already so limited. This is not me being close-minded. I am still working on incorporating different things into my classes, and have had some success since starting this program, I am working towards continuing this process even after the program is done! I am just highlighting the unfortunate obstacles I feel, and my colleagues feel when there is such a high pressure from the Government for that final exam. As Barney Stinson would say " Challenge Accepted!" Because it is not fair for students to feel that the system failed them, it is not fair for students to sit through the majority of their life in a subject that doesn't "click" for them. AND it is not fair that these students do not get to enjoy all of the joys and extremely amazing things that math has to offer!
Campbell, J., & von Renesse, C. (2019). Learning to love math through the exploration of maypole patterns. Journal of Mathematics and the Arts, 13(1-2), 131–151. https://doi.org/10.1080/17513472.2018.1513231
Campbell, J., & von Renesse, C. (2019). Learning to love math through the exploration of maypole patterns. Journal of Mathematics and the Arts, 13(1-2), 131–151. https://doi.org/10.1080/17513472.2018.1513231
It feels like maypole dancing would be a really fun way to explore patterns and combinations. I also like the idea of combining the embodied tasks with technology tasks (Excel.) I feel like this combination would strike a good balance and get buy-in from older students.
ReplyDeleteI resonate with the tensions that you bring up. I also was a student that thrived in the traditional math setting. I loved the concreteness of it; the puzzle and knowing when I had solved it. While I am now seeing that my experience of math was narrow, I also don’t want to leave the joys I had behind. BC no longer has a ministry exam, but I still feel a pressure to broaden the math experience while retaining math skills and preparing for the next level. This is a tough balance to strike in the time that we have with students. Especially given the diversity of skills and experiences they arrive to us with. Olly brought forward Suzans’s reminder: “don’t throw out the baby with the bathwater” and thriving towards a balance that embraces the “new”, and hopefully engages new learners, while holding on to some of the “old” that we love might be what to strive for. I feel that as long as we keep flowing in the direction of change, rather than being stagnant in tradition, we are moving in the right direction?
Taylor, I really feel for you about teaching a curriculum to a test and not having the time or flexibility to explore concepts of your interest, direction or inspiration. That would really make me feel incomplete. This struggle for those with provincial standardized testing is unique.
ReplyDeleteMy current situation is that I have loads of flexibility, the time to teach these incredible extensions connecting dance, poetry and arts to mathematics… but my students are the ones saying “STOP! You’re teaching us anything but math. Where’s the textbook?!” It’s quite jarring to have this kind of ironic pressure from students not wanting to connect to other fields and disciplines.
I believe that seeing the connections between the disciplines is what gives meaning to the breadth of knowledge out there. When in highschool, I loved isolated math too seeing it as puzzles – like you, Taylor! But exposing myself to these deeper mathematical connections between subjects has brought me so much more joy. This may come to our students too with experience. We have explored the idea of systemic changes in our data feminism course – who is this standardized test for? And why use this test as the measure of success in Quebec?
I can't even tell you who these exams are for. But they are worth 50-100% of the students entire competency 2 mark (70%) Which puts a WACK ton of pressure on 1 exam, on 1 day! I am so for trying new things, and working on bringing in more joy to my classes, and I promise, when I can, I do and will! But I just dislike the feeling of always knowing that the pressure of this exam never goes away until its over.
Delete