環球快看：Mathematical Careers | 數學周：讓你意想不到的職業應用

向右滑動，查看中文內容

What makes a mathematician? Qiu Chengtong, the first Chinese-American mathematician to be awarded the Fields Medal, known as the Nobel Prize in mathematics, once commented, “The true essence of maths is not about solving questions, especially not the ones set by others, but to discover research paths, raise worthy questions and blaze a trail of their own.” The inspiration for his remarks on fundamental maths education should put more focus on cultivating pupils’ interest in learning maths and building their maths thinking.?

(相關資料圖)

Since its establishment, the Wellington maths department has launched the Maths Week programme, which, over the years, has led our pupils to realise that maths is everywhere, including problem-solving, π and the maths time unit. Pupils were inspired by the curiosity of creative games and competitions that deepened their understanding of abstract concepts, so they were equipped with the necessary skills to solve practical issues. One of Wellington’s approaches to building the maths thinking of the pupils allows them to grow into outstanding talents to embrace the ever-changing world.?

Let us look back at our maths week and learn how our inspirational maths team has led Wellington pupils to understand more about Mathematical Careers.??

Primary School

Russell Clarke

Head of Primary Maths

This year’s Maths Week was a resounding success enjoyed by pupils, parents and staff.

The children had a lot of fun learning and testing their mathematical knowledge in various practical situations. Here are some testimonials to this effect:

“I was excited about the ‘bungee egg drop’ because we had to work out how long to make the bungee cord, and we didn’t know if it would work.” (Eason, year 5)?

“I enjoyed going outside during maths lessons, doing sport and measuring our speed, jumping and throwing length.” (Bella, year 5)?

“My favourite thing about Maths Week was measuring the ingredients for our pancakes. We weighed everything carefully and made some delicious snacks.” (Angela, year 4)

Seventy-seven parents also put their maths skills to the test during our parent workshop, and we are proud to say our parents rated the workshop a 4.87 out of 5. It was also an honour for me to hear the extent to which our parents believe in the Wellington approach towards teaching maths; 71% of parents strongly agreed that ‘the Wellington approach to teaching maths benefited their child(ren)’, and the remaining 29% agreed with the statement.?

Maths Week 2022 was a fantastic week for everyone involved. There were fun, challenging mathematical activities. But, most importantly, as it was the focus of this year, our children found out through their experiences how important maths is in many different careers. So this week will help inspire our children during their maths learning and future career choices.?

Senior School

Bradley Dennon?

Head of Mathematics Senior School

Maths week at WCIH is a fantastic opportunity for the Maths Department to share their love for the subject and try to inspire the pupils to see how brilliant it can be. It also provides a platform for teachers to show off their maths knowledge and cement with our pupils how essential maths is in our daily lives.?

This year our theme for maths week is Mathematical Careers. Most of us know that maths is used in our daily lives, but when asked to think of examples, we often cannot think of anything beyond counting money or reading road signs. This week’s goal was to show our pupils careers with a more profound use of maths than expected.?

It is essential in a themed week like this that the pupils can see the link to the curriculum. This makes it feel beneficial and inspires them even more. Throughout the week, our pupils worked on measuring, weighing, perimeter, area, circumference, profit, averages and even tensile strength. These topics appear in the curriculum from year 7 to year 11 and are topics many of our pupils are already very familiar with, just not in the context we gave them.

On Monday, our pupils were learning about maths in fashion design by using pieces of fabric to create a skirt. This involved making the skirt fit specific dimensions of a model, using lots of circle calculations, and then calculating how much profit they wanted to make if they were to sell the skirt.

Maths Week

On Tuesday, we listened to a talk from Dr Di Kang in the theatre. Dr Kang told us how she uses maths daily in her job as a professor of economics. Pupils were learning how important data collection and analysis can be and when we sometimes make links between data that don’t truly exist.

On Wednesday, the pupils learned about maths as a chef by making pancakes. The pupils followed a recipe that required them to scale down the ingredients from 12 to 5 pancakes, then measure and weigh ingredients to make the pancakes with no wasted ingredients at the end.

On Thursday, our pupils were given a choice of learning about maths in artistry or maths in sports careers. In artistry, the pupils were learning how to make regular geometrical shapes with paper, emphasising the most commonly used shapes in design. In sports, the pupils measured and averaged their running times and throwing and jumping distances to decide overall winners in each category.

On Friday, the pupils were working on maths in engineering. The pupils were tasked with creating a bungee that could support an egg, getting it to bounce back up as close to the floor as possible without touching it. In this task, the pupils had to consider the elastic bands’ tensile strength to ensure it was not too short or too long for the 4.5m drop from the balcony.

Our pupils thought highly of this year’s maths week,

“I didn’t realise there was so much maths in designing clothing.”

“That was very interesting. The spurious correlations are crazy.”

“My pancakes were too runny. I think my flour measurements were a little bit wrong. I learned to double check my measurements as my cup to grams ratio was incorrect.”

Maths is the universal language of all sciences. We hope that Wellington pupils’ interest and passion for learning maths are inspired by the engaging maths week and that their maths logic is established to grow into outstanding pupils with critical thinking abilities.?

Swipe left for English

宇宙之大，粒子之微，火箭之速，化工之巧，地球之變，生物之謎，日月之繁，無處不用數學。

——著名數學家華羅庚

研究發現，有的學生不喜歡學習數學，是因為不知道該怎樣把枯燥的數學公式與紛繁復雜的現實社會聯系起來，于是覺得數學是一門沒有實用價值的學科，甚至產生抗拒的心理。其實，這樣的想法與現實大相徑庭，因為數學是一切科學的通用語言，是各行各業都離不開的基石。為了培養學生們積極的學習態度和對數學的好奇心，今年杭州惠靈頓外籍人員子女學校（即杭州惠靈頓國際學校）的數學周以“職業中的數學”為主題，以妙用數學的時裝設計師、智用數學的經濟學家、巧用數學的烹飪大師、活用數學的運動健兒、精用數學的工程師等為每日活動，啟發學生思考不同職業中的數學應用，激發學生的學習興趣，同時也對未來的職業發展做出思考。

今天，請隨我們一起回顧上周數學周的精彩，看看惠靈頓優秀數學教研組的教師們是如何帶領學生體驗職業中的數學的吧。

Russell Clarke

小學部數學教研組長

今年的數學周已圓滿落下帷幕。師生和家長都盡情享受了許多數學學習的快樂。孩子們在實際操作中檢驗日常所學，以實踐檢驗著真理，從中獲得了極大的快樂。讓我們來聽聽孩子們的感受吧。

Eason 五年級

我特別喜歡“落蛋蹦極”這個活動，因為我們要仔細思考蹦極繩最合適的長度，一開始的時候也不知道會不會成功。

Bella五年級

我很喜歡能在數學課上走到外面去，做做運動，測量速度的快慢、跳躍的高度和投擲的距離。

Angela四年級

數學周期間，我最喜歡是測量煎餅配料的過程。我們仔細地稱量了所有東西，最終做了一些超級美味的點心。

我們還在為家長開設的工作坊上，邀請出席的77位家長測試了自己的數學技能，體驗一把學生時代的快樂。在隨后的家長調查中，家長們為研討會打了4.87分（滿分5分）的高分評價， 71%的家長強烈同意“惠靈頓數學教學法能讓孩子從中受益”，其余29%也同樣同意這一說法。家長們的信任與認同是我們持續前進、精益求精的動力，也是共建家校緊密關系的基石。

總而言之，2022年數學周是讓孩子們在玩樂中拔高技能的奇趣一周，更讓孩子們從自身的角度和動手實踐的過程中發現數學在各行各業中的重要意義。這一周的豐富活動將啟發孩子們深入研習數學的興趣，讓孩子們以更堅實的知識基礎和廣闊的視野開展未來的職業選擇。

Bradley Dennon?

中學部數學教研組長

杭州惠靈頓國際學校的數學周有著多重意義：不僅是數學教研組宣告對數學的熱愛、引導學生看到數學的奧妙的大好機會，更是讓老師們充分應用數學專業知識，向學生們強調數學在日常生活中的重要性的平臺。

今年數學周以“職業中的數學”為主題。大家都知道數學是被廣泛應用于日常生活的一門學科，但具體有哪些例子呢？似乎除了點錢、看路標之外，我們很難想到數學其他的具體應用。今年的數學周就能很好地讓學生看到更深入使用數學知識的多種行業。

這一主題與課程所學有著怎樣的聯系呢？當活動主題與課程內容緊密相關時，學生才能從中受益匪淺、產生學習的熱情，而不至于迷失在眼花繚亂的活動中。數學周里，學生在各項活動中研究的是測量、稱重、周長、面積、圓周率、利潤、平均數，甚至抗拉強度；而這些正是七至十一年級學生的課程內容，是許多學生已然爛熟于心的知識，只不過數學周的活動強化了課本知識與日常生活的緊密聯系。

周一，學生用布料制作裙裝，學習時裝設計中的數學要點，比如量體裁衣的尺寸確定、大量的圓周計算等，以及出售這間裙子的利潤與成本等。

同學們對時裝設計中的數學應用感到非常好奇。有位同學說：“真沒想到設計服裝時要用到這么多數學知識。”

數學周

周二，經濟學教授康迪女士在學校大劇場為學生們開展了一場講座，講解數學在經濟學相關的日常工作中具備的重要意義。當前，同學們正在學習數據收集和分析的重要性，以及在并不真正存在的數據間搭建聯系的意義。

周三，同學們動手制作煎餅，了解烹飪中的數學技巧。學生們按照食譜要求，完成從制作12個煎餅到5個煎餅的食材縮減計算，隨后測量、稱重原料，最后制作出沒有浪費材料的煎餅。

活動結束后，同學們紛紛開始反思自己在挑戰中的表現。有位同學說：“我的煎餅黏性太差了。可能是稱面粉時失誤了。我學會了要多次檢查稱重結果，因為多檢查幾次后才發現，原來我的杯對克的比例不對。”

周四，學生可以選擇參加藝術創作中的數學或體育職業中的數學活動。在藝術創作中的數學中，學生學習了如何用紙制作規則的幾何圖形，重點了解了設計中最常用的圖形。在體育數學活動中，學生測量了跑步時間、投擲及跳躍距離，并計算平均值，確定各類別的最終贏家。

周五，學生學習的是工程中的數學，須完成“落蛋蹦極”挑戰，即制作一個能支撐雞蛋的彈力帶，讓雞蛋在不接觸地面的情況下盡可能地反彈回來。在這項挑戰中，學生必須考慮彈力帶的抗拉強度，讓雞蛋從4.5米高的陽臺落下時，蹦極繩的長度剛好能讓雞蛋安全回彈。

自建校以來，杭州惠靈頓國際學校數學教研組定期啟動 “數學周”，帶領學生感受“萬物皆數學”的奇妙、深入了解“π與解決問題”的關系，學習時間單位所蘊含的數學奧妙，今年更是開啟了一場研究“職業中的數學”之旅，在創意迸發的游戲和趣味十足的工作坊中激發學生對數學的興趣、深化認識各行各業中被廣為使用的數學知識，將抽象與現實相結合，培養學生的數學思維。

就這樣，我們引導學生養成積極樂觀的生活態度，熱情地投入所做的每一件事，對萬事萬物充滿好奇心——這體現的是“積極”的惠靈頓特質；能夠批判地思考問題、具備思辨能力、養成科學思維、終生熱愛學習——這體現的是“慎思”的惠靈頓特質；最終，惠靈頓學子將成長為具備優質綜合才能、有能力適應日新月異的世界并茁壯成長的優秀學子。