#MTBoSYuleBlog - Merry Math-mas!

Blogging challenges are typically fun for me, but it also gives me some "analysis paralysis"!  Since I haven't blogged at all this year, I have so many things that I want to share, but then when I sit down to actually write about it, my mind goes completely blank!  

Merry Math-mas 2021

This year has been kind of crazy, starting with me resigning my job in the Spring after 21 years with my district and starting a new job in a much smaller district.  There are challenges with starting over, of course, but one of the best features is that I get to teach with a good friend of mine!  In early November, we were texting back and forth and the idea of Math-mas was born!

We challenged the students to create math-related ornaments and can I just say that I was totally blown away by their creativity!

We presented the challenge to the students before Thanksgiving and they could turn in their ornaments anytime from Dec 1 to Dec 10.  The only requirement was that it had to be math-related and it had to be able to be hung on the tree like a traditional ornament.

To encourage participation, we gave the students 5 extra credit points on their semester final, plus we had prizes for the top 3 as chosen by the Math Department as well as the Principal and Superintendent awards.  We ended up with just over 100 submissions (out of approximately 800 students overall) and choosing our top 3 was soooo difficult!  We had ornaments made out of wood, paper, resin, yarn, clay, plastic canvas - you name it, we had it!  

While I didn't get photos of all of my favorites, here are some of them...

• Pythagoras - This student hand-drew a portrait of Pythagoras and then wrote the Pythagorean Theorem on the back
• Pi - Pi was probably the most popular ornament theme with several playing on the "pie" idea
• Cardinal - This is our school mascot and the student included lots of math-y things they had learned this year!
• 2/1 - This one is hard to see some of the detail, but there are even "square root" birds flying around!
• Classroom - The detail in this ornament was amazing and ended up winning 1st place.  There were students sitting in desks and a teacher teaching some Algebra at the board, complete with a "Math is Fun!" poster on the wall
• Ugly Sweater - This one just brought a smile to my face every time I saw it! 

Overall, I think it was a success!  The students enjoyed looking at the various ornaments that were added each day and I can't wait to see what they do next year!