The Magic Mathworks Travelling Circus is an educational charity and a company limited by guarantee. Though our memorandum and articles of association allow wider activities, our experience and competence are strictly confined to the use of manipulatives and interactives in the mathematics classroom. Of relevance to the Cn60 project, we have worked with children here and overseas building polyhedral and lattice models with commercial kits (Polydron Frameworks, Zome Tool, Molmod, Orbit). We operate a touring maths lab which has been on the road for 20 years. We publish extensively, largely articles of the tips-for-teachers sort in the journals of the Mathematical Association and the Association for Teachers of mathematics. Over the last 3 years we have been proud to be associated with the Royal Institution's 'mathematics masterclass' programme.
Paul Stephenson,
founder, operations director and company secretary
Bryson (unauthenticated)
Sep 15, 2009 8:53 AM
Paul,
I think that the mathematical aspects of this project are very important and interesting. Hence my attempts to get Mathematicians along! I have no problem with 'other' modelling systems although, obviously, I have imagined giving people the opportunity to play with ping-pong ball subsets (e.g. pentagons and C60s) to see how they fit together and what structures one can generate - e.g. nanotubes.
The fractal nature of the structure also stands out - I contacted the mathematician that is, apparently, most associated with fractals, Kenneth Falconer at St-Andrews. Unfortunately he's in the classic academic position of being overwhelmed by his own fund-raising and research. He did however contact the LMS and Ri maths fellow ( Chris Budd) and pass on the idea. Hence the response from Caroline Davis, see the mathematicians page.
What I'd appreciate now is you putting in 'what I think we can do' - somewhere on the site, possibly here. Using your contacts to chase up a few of Maths academics, or other professionals, who'd be up for coming along and applying for some money would be worth a fortune!