Category: General

A third partner school in Italy

Author Philipp LarmannDate
General

All good things come in threes! With the successful application of the Istituto Comprensivo “Commenda”, there are now three official MathCityMap partner schools in Italy. Maths teacher Manuela Saponaro created two trails in the vicinity of the school in Brindisi and tried them out with her students.

She told us about the trails she created and her experience with her class as follows:

“Both Math trail cross well-known places in the city and through tasks suitable for different school levels test students on various areas from numerical to geometric, trying to develop in them the ability to problem solving and encouraging creativity.

The trails were tested both with pupils of the school and with a group of Polish students and teachers during an Erasmus + project. The students were also provided with the paper file in addition to the use of the app, in order to then reflect on their task resolution methods.

The students initially seemed disoriented since the approach to the problem of Mathematics was different from what they had been accustomed to until then. After the initial surprise and further clarification on the use of the app, the dominant feeling was the excitement and the desire to win the challenge.

Elements of strength were certainly the playful approach and the collaboration between the boys. These felt free to make their contribution without fear of error, while we noticed hesitation in wanting to use the tips in order not to lose points … they wanted to make it on their own even at the risk of ending the chances of attempting.

A critical element that we observed was time management and the inability to adequately use measuring instruments. Moreover, thanks to this activity, gaps have clearly emerged on the contents that will be recovered and enhanced.

The course gave the opportunity to enhance the attention on some details of their city on which the students had never dwelt and become aware of how much mathematics was around them.

Even the Polish colleagues and the Italian teachers involved were enthusiastic and understood how this way of doing mathematics is highly engaging and inclusive and gives the possibility to solve real problems of reality.

The totality of the participants  following a questionnaire administered to them expressed the desire to include the use of Math City Map within the curricular activities or as an in-depth tool during the guided tours.”

The trails are available under the following names and codes in the MathCityMap system:

  1. Matematica tra parchi e piazze (5710839)
  2. Dal centro al Casale … passeggiata matematica (6910838)

In addition to the experiences Manuela Saponaro shared with us, she wrote an article for the 36° Convegno nazionale Incontri con la matematica, an important national conference on mathematics didactics in Italy, in collaboration with other mathematics teachers, Lucia Del Chiaro, Giovanna Zito and Eugenia Taranto. Here, the teachers reported on their previous activities with MathCityMap under the title “Matematica in città”.

The package with the official partner school badge and the MCM measuring instruments is already on its way to Italy and we are very much looking forward to receiving more applications from all over the world.

All further information on the partner school programme and the requirements for application can be found both in the article on the first MCM partner school and on the homepage of our MaSCE³ project.

 

Trail of the month: A LECLIC trail

Author Philipp LarmannDate
General

With the Trail of the Month for January, we would like to introduce you to a special mathtrail created as part of the ERASMUS+ project LECLIC “Living in the Era of Climate Change”, which uses innovative trends in the STEAM curriculum and cloud computing to raise awareness about environmental issues and climate change.

The students and teachers participating in the project will be encouraged to reflect on the need for behavioural change in their families’ lifestyles to mitigate climate change by analysing the bi-directional relationship between lifestyle and climate change, analysing the current lifestyle and quality of life in their European region and suggesting how they can change their habits on a large scale.

The project is organised in the form of four LECLIC conferences on climate change, where students from Portugal, Spain, Italy and Greece analyse the similarities and differences of climate change in each region. It is very important to get to know the different localities, which is why the use of MathCityMap has become an important tool in the project.

This month’s mathtrail “A LECLIL trail” is located in the Spanish city of Puerto Real and is available in the MCM app under the code 3812670 and on the MathCityMap web portal here.

The trail is made up of five tasks, all of which relate to the city and the impacts Puerto Real could be affected by if climate change continues to progress.

Ana Serradó Bayés, the creator of the trail, gives us a short interview below about her work with MathCityMap and her trail. Enjoy reading!

 

How did you come across the MathCityMap project?

In May 2020, when Spanish inhabitants were confined at home due to COVID19 pandemia I participated in the elearning training “Education School of Miguel of Guzman”. During the school, Claudia Lazaro of the Spanish Federation of Maths Teachers’ Association (FESPM) and one of the MathCityMap partners presented us with this ERASMUS+ project. One of the activities was to construct a trail. At that moment, it was difficult to construct a trail because we were only able to walk 1km far from home. But, from the terrace of my home I was able to admire the “Porvenir gardens”. I walked through them taking photos, making measurements,  while I was willing to return to normality and prepare a trail for my students, who would be able to learn mathematics outside their homes. The name of that trail is “Cuidemos los Jardines del Porvenir” (Take care of the Porvenir Gardens, 012984). 

 

Please describe your trail?

A LECLIC Trail is a STEAM tour to analyze how climate change affects Puerto Real city in South Spain. It consists of five tasks with a total length of 1.5 km and a duration of 1 hour and 20 minutes. Junior secondary students are asked to solve five STEAM problems and infer on the consequences climate change can have in five iconic locations of the city. Students participating in it investigate, analyze, calculate accessible and inaccessible lengths and develop stochastical thinking. And, infer about how Puerto Real could be affected by the climate change concerning to the drinkable water, the flooding of its beach, the destruction due to high waves of the 19th century fortified quay, the experience of a “wind drought” and the change in the sea level height.

 

How do you use MCM and why?

At our school, the students of Colegio La Salle-Buen Consejo use tablets at school and mobiles outside the school. In particular, the MCM is useful for them to understand the integration of two independent technologies: online maps and quizzes. As a member of the STEM department, I am involved in the development of activities that help students to understand the transdisciplinary approach of STEAM. In particular we are involved in many ERASMUS+ projects that use innovative technologies that help the integration of the other subjects. 

I consider that these kinds of trials help students to develop the four global competences of communication, collaboration, critical thinking and creativity. Communication and collaboration because students are asked to solve it in a team, due to the fact that most of the measurements to be done on site need more than one person to do it. Secondly, because some of them have a high complexity that needs a discussion on the creation of strategies on how to solve the problem, to value its accuracy, developing their critical thinking, and finally decide which is the solution. The fact that MCM puts math tasks outside the classroom in a real context can extend the problem solving process to a geometrical or algebraic modelling process. 

The possibility of introducing hints in the MCT tasks is very useful because then it is open to attend the diversity of our schools and provide students with the theoretical principles that they can use to solve the situation. When returning at school the analysis of the math trail is also an opportunity to deepen their learning and formalize the modelling process developed.

 

Describe your favourite task on the trail. How can it be solved?

I think that all five tasks of the trail are interesting because the students need to infer about how climate change could affect their city and this kind of reflection is of pressing topical interest. But, if I have to choose one, my favorite task is “The wind rose in Sant Telmo Square”. San Telmo is a new square in the old city that most of the students of Puerto Real did not know about their existence. Even more about the wind rose oriented in the center of the square. Admiring the tiles of the wind rose and their symmetry is an artistic and mathematical activity by itself. Nevertheless, the fact that the students need to analyse the direction and speed of the wind transforms it into a scientific and engineering design activity. The comprensension of the stochastic nature of the wind speed is essential to answer the task. But, also this process of thought helps students to understand the difference between using a deterministic model for the speed and the stochastic and chaotic nature of the wind.

 

 

A busy MCM-autumn in Slovakia

Author Philipp LarmannDate
General

Autumn was busy with training and implementation of MathCityMap trails across Slovakia.

At the end of September, the Primary and Lower-Secondary School in Nábrežná street in Nové Zámky held a project day, which was attended by all 9th grade pupils. They explored the town centre, the surroundings of the school and also the villages of Branovo and Dvory nad Žitavou by solving MCM trails. The Department of Mathematics of the Charles University in Zámov participated in this beautiful project.

Silvia Haringová, a PhD student from Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra, taught three groups of full-time and one group of part-time pre-service teachers for primary education students how to create and implement mathematical trails during the workshops. Sona Čeretková did the same activity for future secondary mathematics teachers.

Janka Medová and Silvia Haringová visited Primary and Lower-Secondary School in Duklianska street in Bánovce nad Bebravou, where they conducted training on mathematical trails. A teacher from Primary and Lower-Secondary School in Gorazdova street in Bánovce nad Bebravou prepared a mathematical trail in the footsteps of Sherlock Holmes for his 6.A pupils in the school building. Doctoral students Katka Laššová and Silvia Haringová came to help him with the implementation of the trail with his pupils. 

Pre-service mathematics teachers Michal Fojtík and Peter Košt’ál prepared trails for pupils from grades 4, 5 and 9 in the primary and lower-secondary school in Slatina nad Bebravou. Janka Medová,  Katka Laššová, Silvia Haringová and Peter Košt’ál came to Slatina nad Bebravou to implement the trail.

Another trail took place at the United Catholic School in Nemšová, where the pupils of three classes of grade 5 solved tasks prepared for them by their teachers Veronika Meščánková and Majka Šimáková. The trail included both indoor and outdoor tasks. Janka and Silvia could not miss the realization again.

 

 

In the beautiful surroundings of Zaježovské Lazy, a workshop on mathematical trails was held for teachers from all over Slovakia, to whom the creation and implementation of MCM trails was presented by Silvia.

The webinar was another event to promote the trails among teachers from all over Slovakia. It was led by Silvia together with Veronika Bočková. It was attended by more than 150 participants.

Silvia also travelled with the trails to Skalica to Primary and Lower-Secondary School in Vajanského street, where she came to help the teacher Zuzka Chytilova and the 9th grade pupils prepare a trail for the 5th grade pupils.           

At the end of October Silvia conducted a training on MathCityMap trails in Stara Ľubovňa for teachers from the primary and lower-secondary school on Komenského street. Together with the teacher Libuše Hnátová, they prepared a trail around the school for the training.

In November, the Science and Technology Week took place in Slovakia. During this Silvia visited St. Mark’s Primary and Lower-Secondary School in Nitra and Silvia helped the teacher Kika Hazuchova, who had prepared the tasks in advance, to upload them to the MathCityMap portal. A few days later, they enacted the trail together with the pupils of 6th and 7th grade. Silvia also visited the grammar school Gymnasium of Ivan Kupec in Hlohovec, where she prepared and implemented a mathematical trail in the main square of Hlohovec for the pupils. During the Week of Science and Technology, Veronika Bočková carried out a home trail aimed at revising natural numbers at the Pribina Primary and Lower-Secondary School in Nitra with all 5th grade pupils.

As part of the course focused on mathematical problem solving, a former student of the Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra, now a teacher, Kristína Čierniková from the Primary and Lower-Secondary School of Pavol Demitra in Dubnica nad Váhom, came to talk to the future primary teachers about the activities she does with her pupils. She also shared with them her experiences with the implementation of mathematical trails, whether outdoors or indoors with the primary pupils, even with the pupils of the first grade. 

The mathematical trail focused on fractions, situated in the main building of the University, was attended by pupils from the out-of-school science and mathematics activity, which is supported by national project funded by the Agency for Research and Development APVV-20-0599 Intervention Programme in Natural Sciences and Mathematics.

The last MCM trail so far in this calendar year was tackled by pupils who came to the Open Day at the Faculty of Science and Informatics.

There were also other mathematical trails in this autumn period. We are aware that some were carried out in the Primary and Lower-Secondary School in Kanianka, the grammar school M.R.Štefánik Gymnasium in Nové Mesto nad Váhom, the Private Primary and Lower-Secondary School in Nová Dubnica, the St. Joseph’s United School in Nové Mesto nad Váhom and the Kukučínova Primary School in Detva.

We are delighted with the interest of teachers and schools in MathCityMap and look forward to continuing this great trend in our slovakian community in 2023.

MathCityMap on Begabungslotse

Author Philipp LarmannDate
General

The MathCityMap web portal and app is now also featured in the online portal of Bildung & Begabung (Education & Talent), the Begabungslotse (Talent Guide).

The “Begabungslotse” is a web portal which has made it its task to provide quality-assured information on the topics of individual support, talent development and the promotion of giftedness for interested parents, teachers, students and non-school education practitioners, thus contributing to equal opportunities in education.

There are now over 5,500 entries in the Talent Guides portal and the service is additionally enriched with podcasts, videos and downloads.

The MathCityMap entries are available for the web portal here, and for the app here.

MathCityMap wishes you a Merry Christmas!

Author Philipp LarmannDate
General

Dear MathCityMap users,

at the end of the year 2022, we would like to take a brief look back at the many great events and developments that the past months have offered MathCityMap, as we do every year:

  • Over 20,000 new tasks were created in the system this year, so that we now count a total of over 50,000 tasks in the MathCityMap portal, of which approx. 15,200 tasks have been published. There has never been such a strong increase in tasks in a single MathCityMap year!
  • A total of 45,000 mathtrails were downloaded in 2022. In addition, 2,700 digital classrooms were conducted with a total of approximately 12,400 participants and almost 1,700 badges were awarded to MCM authors.
  • We also saw a record increase in the number of registered users: Approximately 8,000 new MathCityMap users have registered in the system, bringing the MCM community to over 18,000 members, almost doubling in size within a year.
  • We also had a new addition to our team. Patrick André Müller has been supporting us since this year and, together with our technical team, ensures that MathCityMap continues to function smoothly for you.
  • Our Erasmus+ project MaSCE³ (Math Trails in School, Curriculum and Educational Environments of Europe) has been successfully completed. We would like to thank our European partners from Portugal, France, Estonia and Spain in particular for the fantastic cooperation during the project and we are already very excited to see how cooperation can develop in the future.
  • Of course, MCM was not to be missed at international events. We and our partners presented the system and its latest developments at the CERME conference and at the Tomorrow Summit in Porto. In addition, there were again numerous workshops and activities that brought MathCityMap closer to researchers, teachers and students.
  • The partner school programme launched as part of the MaSCE³ project has also been widely expanded. There are now 30 official MathCityMap partner schools in a total of 8 countries that have successfully completed the application process and we are already looking forward to many more applications from all over the world.
  • The e-learning tool ASYMPTOTE, which was introduced in last year’s annual review and has its roots in MCM@Home, is now fully usable for adaptive and synchronous distance learning and we are already excited about how positive the initial feedback has been.

We are once again blown away by the fantastic and exciting developments in the MCM system, not to mention the community. Thank you for your joy and willingness to experience mathematics in a new way and to give learners a unique view of this great subject and their environment. You fill MathCityMap with life, new tasks and trails and thus make a decisive contribution to constantly rethinking and improving mathematics learning and the functions of MathCityMap.

We wish you and your families a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year 2023. We are already looking forward to welcoming many new members to the MCM community and discovering new, exciting tasks all over the world.

Your MathCityMap Team

Trail of the month: Exploring the other side of Opuwo

Author Philipp LarmannDate
General

This month we would like to present you a trail from a country that has hardly been visible in the MathCityMap community so far. The Mathtrail of the month December “Exploring the other side of Opuwo” comes from the city of Opuwo in Namibia, where there is a growing enthusiasm for MathCityMap as well. The trail can be accessed in the MCM app under the code 5612172 and can also be found in the web portal.

The trail consists of a total of 5 tasks, which are thematically located primarily in the topics of areas and volume calculation and are suitable in their complexity especially for the 9th and 10th grade level. Often the tasks also have a relation to crafts, which makes the relevance for the everyday world particularly clear.

Highschool teacher Given Kahale Matengu , to whom we owe our new Trail of the Month, already created several other math trails with MathCityMap in the past years. In a short interview he tells us about his experiences with MCM so far. Have fun reading!

 

How did you come across the MathCityMap project?

I was introduced to the MathCityMap project in 2017 during my M. Ed studies at Rhodes University, South Africa. In one of the contact sessions my supervisor Professor Marc Schäfer invited Professor Matthias Ludwig to Namibia (my home country where we sometimes use to attend contact sessions). It was this time that I learned the operations of the MCM project by creating my tasks through the help and guidance of Professor Matthias Ludwig.

 

Where is your trail located? What is special about your trail?

“Exploring the other side of Opuwo” math trail is one of the many trails that I have created with my teacher participants around the town of Opuwo. The trail is located at the southwest side of the town and contains five tasks based on the topics of length, area, volume and proportion. This trail is best walked when it is not the rainy season as most of the spots where the tasks are located are prone to flooding.

 

How do you use MCM and why?

I use the MCM app as a mobile tool to analyse how teachers can use authentic tasks to conceptually teach the topics of length, area, volume, ratio and proportion to grade 9 learners. With a group of nine secondary school teachers, we create tasks within school environments, the town centre as well as the nearby surroundings of the town of Opuwo, and then teachers use these tasks to teach outdoors. The aim is to popularise mathematics within the community and at the same time campaign against policies that prohibit the use of smartphones in teaching and learning contexts in the region and the country at large.

 

Describe your favorite task on the trail. How can it be solved?

My favourite task in this trail is the “painting wall Task” which asks learners to calculate the quantity of paint in millilitres that is needed to cover the exterior frontside of a building in a situation where a litre of paint covers a surface area of 6 square meters. This task can be solved by first calculating the area of the wall and then subtracting the area of the two rectangular windows. The next step is then to use a ratio of 1 liter : 6 square meters to determine the needed paint.

First, in this task learners get to understand that even in reality, when working outside you need mathematical concepts and modelling skills to calculate the surface that needs to be painted. Secondly, the solving of this task involves measurements, so when solving the task learners can learn how to use a tape measure, how to convert between units as well as learning how to round off to the nearest whole number. Thirdly, this task teaches learners that for one to paint the wall, it would be necessary to have an idea of how much paint to use, hence an informed decision of how much paint to buy. Buying too much paint is a waste of money and buying too little paint can become a total headache, so whoever needs to paint the wall would want to ensure that the estimate is accurate.

 

 

 

MathCityMap at the “Tomorrow Summit”

Author Philipp LarmannDate
General

On November 10 and 11, the 5th edition of the “Tomorrow Summit” took place in Porto. It was an event on technology and innovation organized by the Academic Federation of Porto. This year, the program was planned in special connection with the European Year of Youth.  The aim of this event was to lead the discussion for “Tomorrow”. At the Tomorrow Summit, participants found a wide range of innovation, research and technology that attracted many visitors. 

The MathCityMap and ASYMPTOTE projects were represented at this event to display innovative ideas for teaching mathematics and mathematics education in general. 

Portugal’s 6th partner school

Author Philipp LarmannDate
General

We are very pleased to welcome the sixth Portuguese partner school, Escola Secundária de Caldas das Taipas, to our partner school network. A report about the work with MathCityMap so far and the further plans and application possibilities of Mathtrails was written by the math teacher Arminda Machado, who initiated the application process:

“At ESCT (Secondary School of Caldas das Taipas), the MathCityMap application was used to create Mathtrails, an activity that contributed to the valorization of information and communication technologies and to the development of specific skills in mathematics among the students, namely logical thinking and problem solving.

This school year, the students at our school integrated the Erasmus+ project Maths&Art with the International Mathematics Day, which is celebrated on March 14. As part of this, a great challenge was launched for all ESCT math students, which consisted of forming teams of three members representing each class to participate in a Mathtrail with MathCityMap, put together by themselves and implemented on the school campus. The students accepted this invitation with enthusiasm and the initiative, in which the entire educational community participated, was a success.

The courses were conducted outside the classroom and in a real-world context, focusing on hands-on and experimental work, which increased the students’ motivation to learn. Students walked in small groups and in constant collaboration along trails guided by the MathCityMap application previously installed on their mobile devices, solving a series of mathematical problems related to objects or constructions present in the outdoor areas of the school. In this way, they mobilized the fundamental knowledge acquired in class. In certain situations, students used measuring tools such as the tape measure and protractor to address the practical side of the subject and the importance of its application in everyday life. The fact that students have the opportunity to develop various skills such as independence, critical thinking, creativity, collaboration, and communication while completing these tasks makes the use of this tool even more important. After completing the Mathtrails, students could analyze and discuss the solutions and results of each task in class with the math teacher. This type of activity adds a new dynamic to the classroom that is very attractive to students and promotes educational success.

For the next school year, a math trail is planned in the city of Guimarães, connected with mathematical problems related to monuments of the historical center, to be carried out by students of partner schools from Spain, Finland, Italy and Turkey during the student exchange planned in ESCT in the framework of the Erasmus+ project Maths&Art. In addition to broadening knowledge in the field of mathematics and information and communication technologies, this trail aims to develop intercultural and language skills.”

The package with the official partner school plaque and the MCM measuring tools is already on its way to Portugal and we are very much looking forward to receiving further applications from all over the world.

All further information about the partner school program and the requirements for the application can be found in the article about the first MCM partner school as well as on the homepage of our project MaSCE³.

A new Spanish partner school

Author Philipp LarmannDate
General

In Spain, too, there are more and more official MathCityMap partner schools. The fourth Spanish school that has successfully applied to the partner school program is IES Santa Eulalia, in the city of Mérida. As part of the application, which was initiated by math teacher María Bravo Conde, a total of three math trails were created and tested with students from the school.

Regarding the motivation to integrate MathCityMap into the teaching, the school’s team wrote as follows:

“Using MathCityMap allows us to bring math closer to a real and everyday environment, and our students have to work together in groups, make independent and critical decisions, take initiative, and evaluate different options to find solutions.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The first trail is located directly at the school, the second trail is located on an island in the Guadiana River, which flows through Mérida, and the third trail is located in a park that the students of the school can easily reach by bus.

The trails are available under the following names and codes in the MathCityMap system:

  1. Ruta matemática por el IES Santa Eulalia (079113)
  2. La isla de Mérida (256425)
  3. El parque de las Siete Sillas (786348)

The package with the official partner school plaque and the MCM measuring instruments is already on its way to Spain and we are very much looking forward to receiving further applications from all over the world.

All further information about the partner school program and the requirements for the application can be found in the article about the first MCM partner school as well as on the homepage of our project MaSCE³.

 

The MathCityMap Summer in Slovakia

Author Philipp LarmannDate
General

In the summer of 2022, several events, such as conferences and so-called summer schools for young scientists, took place all over Europe on the topics of development of mathematics education and research in the field of mathematics education. Several of them were attended by the staff of the Department of Mathematics of the Faculty of Mathematics of the University of Constantine the Philosopher in Nitra, as well as by teachers and students of various disciplines of the University of Constantine the Philosopher in Nitra. The aim of the visit was, among other things, to make MathCityMap better known in Europe and to present the latest findings on the use of MathCityMap in the classroom.

In the following report, Janka Medová, Veronika Bočková, Soňa Čeretková and Silvia Haringová present the activities of the Slovak MathCityMap Summer:

The first of the summer schools, Socio-scientific Issues in Mathematics and Science Initial Teachers Education: Join a unique intercultural experience preparing you for the future classroom! was held on 15-24 June 2022 at the Faculty of Education, Charles University in Prague, Czech Republic. Soňa Čeretková prepared and facilitated a workshop including MathCityMap trails named Preparation of teaching with the use of innovative teaching methods and outdoor teaching with the support of digital technologies. The summer school was organised within the Erasmus+ ENSITE project (https://icse.eu/ensite/), as was the summer school Dealing with environmental issues in science education – Deepening future science and maths teachers’ learning by teaching. A two-day workshop on MCM trails as a tool for developing awareness of environmental issues was prepared in Varna by Janka Medová and Veronika Bočková. The summer school took place in Varna, Bulgaria, 31 July-11 August 2022 and was organised by the Institute of Mathematics and Computer Science of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences.

 

At the summer school for graduate students and early career researchers Intensive training school in qualitative research design and research methods in mathematics education supported by European Society for Research in Mathematics Education (ERME), held in Nitra on 29 June – 1 July Silvia Haringová referred about her work with teacher in co-designing and teaching the MCM trails.

During the two-day Summer School of Didactics of Mathematics, which took place on 6-7 July 2022 at the Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice, Slovakia, primary and secondary school teachers solved a mathematical trail using the MathCityMap application in the city centre. The seminar led by Silvia Haringova continued after solving all the tasks in the premises of the university. During the seminar, participants learned how to create a trail on the portal and received manuals for creating math trails in MathCityMap.

A workshop on MCM trails was conducted by Janka Medová and Veronika Bočková in the centre of Utrecht, the Netherlands, as part of Utrecht Summer School: Mathematics Education held on 15-25 August 2022. The implementation of the summer school was also supported by the ICSE Academy project, in which researchers from several departments of Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra collaborate with the Freudenthal Institute of the University of Utrecht to design and implement professional development programmes for teachers of mathematics, science and engineering (STEM) with a European dimension.

 

 

Janka Medová went also to Usti nad Labem in the Czech Republic, where she attended an event called the Summer School of Didactics of Science STEM Subjects, consisting of several accredited programmes for teachers of mathematics and science. As a lecturer, she collaborated in the implementation of the programme Didactic Principles in STEM subjects with colleagues from the J.E. Purkyně University, Ústí nad Labem and Charles University in Prague. The proposed professional development programme included MCM trails and is based on a joint book of 16 authors, didacticians of various subjects, entitled Didactic principles in science education: methodological guide for teachers of biology, chemistry, physics, geography, informatics, mathematics and lecturers of environmental education. The book was officially invited on Thursday, 18 August 2022, with the participation of the Dean of the Faculty of Science of UJEP and the Faculty of Education of Charles University.

From 22 to 26 August 2022, the prestigious summer school for doctoral students and young researchers called YESS (YERME Summer School) organized with the support of ERME at Johannes Kepler University in Linz, Austria, was attended by a doctoral student of the Department of Mathematics, a student of the study programme Theory of Mathematics Education, Mgr. Silvia Haringová. In TWG 1: Mathematics teacher expertise, practice, and professional development, led by Alf Coles from the University of Bristol (UK), she presented partial results and proposed methodology of her PhD thesis on Collaboration as a means of professional growth of mathematics teachers where she collaborates with mathematics teachers in development of MCM trails.

 

 

In the last days before the start of the lecture period, 7-9 September 2022, the Faculty of Natural Sciences and Informatics of the Constantine the Philosopher University in Nitra, Slovakia hosted the thirteenth ERME Topic Conference 13 (ETC13) entitled MEDA 3 Mathematics Education in the Digital Age. The MEDA3 conference follows the MEDA conferences organized at the Department of Mathematical Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Denmark in 2018 and Linz School of Education, Johannes Kepler University, Austria in 2020. During the conference Silvia Haringova presented a contribution Identification of domains of mathematics teachers’ knowledge addressed in reflection on technology-supported mathematical trails, co-authored with Janka Medova. The presented model of PD for mathematics teachers and the MCM trails evoked rich discussion.

A week later, on 13-16 September 2022, Janka Medova presented another contribution of the team Haringova-Medova, titled Factors affecting collaboration in designing and enacting MathCityMap trails by in-service teachers at the conference TiMER Trends in Mathematics Education Research held in Krakow, Poland. Event was supported by European Society for Research in Mathematics Education (ERME) within the call Initiatives for Supporting Emerging Communities for Mathematics Education Research in Eastern Europe.

And, since the school year in Slovakia has already started, we are again visiting the schools where we develop and enact the new MCM trails in collaboration with mathematics teachers.