An article about the people behind the scenes of Aotearoa’s response to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Shaun Hendy shares his experiences providing model-based data and recommendations to the government.

Maths Week 2020 is being held between 10 August and Friday 14 August.

Maths Week provides resources for students and teachers.  The material Maths Week is written for all students from Year 1 through to Year 11 at different levels:

• Level 1 – primarily for Years 1 and 2.
• Level 2 – primarily for Years 3 and 4.
• Level 3 – primarily for Years 5 and 6.
• Level 4 – primarily for Years 7 and 8.
• Level 5 – primarily for Years 9, 10 and 11.

One of the Maths Week series (Maths Millionaire) has also been translated into te reo Māori.

Teachers who register for Maths Week have access to answers to questions and other notes.

Maths Week resources are available free, on-line, to teachers, parents and students.

For teachers to register themselves and their class numbers, go to www.mathsweek.co.nz/

Maths Week 2020 will be on from Monday 10 August until Friday 14 August.

Last year there were 288 441 students and 6657 teachers registered throughout New Zealand.  This is an increase of 5594 students and 543 teachers from 2018.

Maths Week is written for all students from Year 1 through to Year 11.

It is available free, on-line, to teachers, parents and students.

Maths Week material is written:

• to encourage students’ interest in mathematics and statistics
• to give teachers resources that they can use in the classroom, particularly material that requires some research and which may not be readily available to them, or that can be used electronically in class
• to show the pleasure that mathematics can provide and some of the everyday places where it can be used
• to give teachers material that can provide extension.

Maths Week has five levels:

• Level 1 – primarily for Years 1 and 2.
• Level 2 – primarily for Years 3 and 4.
• Level 3 – primarily for Years 5 and 6.
• Level 4 – primarily for Years 7 and 8.
• Level 5 – primarily for Years 9, 10 and 11.

This year, the Maths Week sections are similar to those of 2019.

• Survivor series. A series of in-class tasks at levels 1 – 5 for each day during Maths Week.  Each day’s tasks has a theme (the same theme for all levels).
• Maths Millionaire. Maths questions, with junior (Years 5 and 6), middle (Years 7 and 8), senior (Years 9 – 11) and family divisions.
• The Maths Chaser. Maths questions at each of levels 2 – 5.
• Daily Dollar. Maths activities at each of levels 1 – 5.
• Dollars and cents. Questions to encourage financial capability (primarily for Years 9 – 11) for each day during Maths Week.  Each day’s questions has a theme.
• Super Challenge. One mathematical challenge each day for four days.  Those who answer all four correctly can get a certificate.
• Some Maths Matters. Five chapters on various mathematical topics.
• Two interactive games.

Maths Millionaire and the games are easily accessed by students on their tablets or phones.

Teachers who register for Maths Week have access to answers to questions and other notes.

For teachers to register themselves and their class numbers, go to https://www.mathsweek.co.nz/

What’s the superpower every student needs? Statistics, of course.

Dr. Samuel Echevarria-Cruz, Dean of Liberal Arts, Social and Behavioral Sciences at Austin Community College, and Rob Santos, Vice President and Chief Methodologist at The Urban Institute, led a discussion about how statistics—the science of learning from data—is the new superpower every student needs in their studies and career.

Statistics influences industries as varied as sports, fashion, public health, and more, and continues to increase in its importance and opportunities. In fact, statistician was named the #1 Best Business Job and #6 among the top 100 Best Jobs by U.S. News & World Report.

Now more than ever, it’s a great time to take a statistics class and prepare yourself for a bright future.

Register to watch a replay

The Concord Consortium are organising an interactive webinar on April 29 at 4 PM ET. Register today. Participants will explore Fast Plants genetic data in your three-dimensional instruction. Participants will receive a lesson plan to teach genetic inheritance patterns and a certificate for one hour of continuing education credit.

See CODAP latest news and happenings: Covid-19 in the US

https://mailchi.mp/concord/april-2020-dse-enews?e=e9cd617879

This is Statistics are celebrating Mathematics & Statistics Awareness Month with a month-long series—meet a statistician in a Facebook Live AMA every Thursday through the end of April. Learn more about this series and the first statistician, Sam Echevarria, here: https://thisisstatistics.org/mathematics-statistics-awareness-month-meet-a-statistician-series

The Concord Consortium hosts a number of data science games and projects for Year 9 – 13 students. CODAP makes data science accessible and empowers students to understand and analyze complex data without hours of coding lessons or years of advanced mathematics. A new collection of Dynamic Data Science activities is now available to get students working with data!

Also check out:

• Community and citizen science: A brief history and report from CitSci 2019
• Teachers examine real-world data and “lifehacking” with CodeR4MATH
• Designing 2030 is designing for the future today

If you are involved in any citizen science projects around Aotearoa, let CensusAtSchool know about your project.

PS: Did you know the R coding language was created in New Zealand!

Rise of the machine learners:

Statistical learning in the computational era

Don’t miss this set of four lectures held from March to April. Get a group together, invite your  colleagues from other departments, or take your stats scholarship students. See the program: IhakaDLE19.