​FYiMaths New Zealand Group

Contact

The New Zealand FYiMaths group was established in 2017 by academics from the University of Auckland and Massey University.
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​We have been promoting the interests of FYiMaths at local and national meetings.  In particular, nationally at the NZ Association of Maths Teachers (NZAMT) biannual conference, at the NZ Mathematics Society (NZMS) annual colloquium, and at the FYSEC (science) 2018 conference.  Locally, we have also participated in conferences for teachers in Auckland, Wellington, and Palmerston North.  We find that teachers welcome feedback from universities on how to better prepare their students and we learn about the pressures they are under and the priorities of their students.

As part of the NZMS Education Group, we contribute to the NZMS newsletter in an education column that comes out 3 times a year.  Through this we are promoting discussions around first year teaching and the NZ secondary school exams and curriculum.  We have a LOOMIO (online discussion) group that discussed and gets input on these ideas.  We have also had delegations go to Wellington to meet with the Ministry of Education to discuss changes in the secondary system (picture attached).

Recent New Zealand Conferences

NZAMT Conference, October 2017
NZMS Panel: ‘Preparing for the Future, Transition from High School to University: Debating Technology’ with moderator Cami Sawyer (Massey U) and participants Julia Novak (UoA), Stephen McConnachie (Middleton Grange School), and Dan Meyer (keynote speaker from USA, Chief Academic Officer at Desmos).  The session was well attended and sparked lively interactions.
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FYiMaths 2 hour workshop: ‘Seeing the future: First Year Mathematics at University, the challenges faced by lecturers and students in an ever-changing landscape’ was organised by Cami Sawyer and Julia Novak.  We had attendance from many universities around NZ including staff from UoA, Massey (Albany and Palmerston North Campuses), Otago, and Victoria.  One of the original FYiMaths founders, Dr Deb King of the University of Melbourne, presented and we had activities that opened communication and brought out common concerns, issues, and misconceptions. Everyone seemed to have learned something from the workshop.

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NZMS Colloquium 2017

• A session to help mathematicians understand the NZ secondary schooling system and how that effects universities.
• FYiMaths session ‘Seeing the future: First Year Mathematics at University, the challenges faced by lecturers and students in an ever-changing landscape’ with more of a university lecturer focus.
• An open discussion about university teaching discussion, what works and what doesn’t.
• Discussion around what is school mathematics and what should be taught in schools.
• A group wordle ‘Art’ project: Mathematics is . . .

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2018 Workshops
Various workshops and discussions around the changes to the NZ Secondary assessment system n Aukland, Palmerston, North, and online.

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NZMS Colloquium 2018
Five FYiMAths focussed sessions:

• When on-line pre-lecture quizzes are integrated into a course: Exploring the impact of a small-scale change in an instructional model in one large-scale mathematics course.
• Renegotiating the Didactic Contract: Understanding and managing student expectations about your teaching and their learning.
• Promoting relationships between the secondary and tertiary sectors
• Tertiary teaching talk: sharing stories
• An afternoon unconference: Engaging with Educational Issues in Mathematics Workshop, where we discussed issues and strategies related to education depending on the interest of the attendees.

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​2019

• A workshop ‘Post-rigorous thinking in Undergraduate Mathematics’ with a focus on teaching and assessing for understanding with guest speaker Keith Devlin in March at UoA.
  
• Maths modelling for Heads of Secondary School Maths Departments, another one for secondary school maths teachers, and discussions with industry maths modellers involved in MINZ.