It’s hard to believe it’s already been a month since PATH18! Our annual celebration of the collective wisdom of our community kicked off on a brisk June morning in Lancefield, Victoria. Spread over two days, PATH18 was a chance for our teacher community to gather, share stories, and learn for each other. It was also a chance for Maths Pathway to share some of our own tips and tricks of the trade.
Day 1
After a brief introductory session, the 87 teachers who had made their way to the event dived into a fun first day of professional learning. Some of the best sessions from Day 1 included ‘Here is a never fail rich task’, ‘Making Maths Meaningful’, and the exciting ‘How to run rich learning tasks’, where teachers got to participate in a ‘breakout’ activity lead by Melissa Stephens and Danielle Jones from Mill Park Secondary College.
In the afternoon we had a keynote address from Maths Pathway Founder, Richard Wilson, on the importance of mathematics education in an increasingly automated workforce. The good news is that teaching in general, and mathematics skills are both going to stay valuable for a while!
Following a panel session with some people from Maths Pathway, everyone got a chance to relax and have those all-important watercooler discussions with others at the event. After a lovely three course dinner —and a couple of lively games of bingo— everyone retired for the night ready for another great day of learning.
Day 2
The second day kicked off with a highly rated presentation by Adam, from Clarkson Community High School, on ‘Inviting students to grow’. Someone said of this session:
It was concise but detailed. It applied both within and beyond Maths Pathway. It was very thought provoking about the plethora of ways that a growth mindset can be developed and maintained, even outside of policies and procedures (or people)
Some of our other most popular sessions were run by external presenters. Andrew Lorimer-Derham from Thinksquare ran two very popular sessions that focused on getting students thinking about and enjoying maths through interesting mathematical puzzles. Jennifer Bowden form MAV also ran two sessions on getting the most out of resources like Maths300 to make maths meaningful.
Some other great sessions from Day 2 were ‘How to become a rich learning expert’ by our Head of Learning Michaela, and the great presentation and discussion about Year 10 facilitated by Deb and Jenny from Lavalla Catholic College.
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For us here in the Maths Pathway office, we think that our main takeaway is that we have an amazing community of educators that we get to work with and that with your passion we’ll continue to make Maths Pathway better, and change the world!
From what we’ve heard back so far there were lots of attendees who were excited to take back what they learnt to their schools and try everything out for themselves. Of particular interest this year were rich learning tasks and mini-lessons, with multiple sessions dedicated to these topics.
With an overall feedback rating of 4.8 out of 5, we think everyone who attended had a chance to extract some value to take back to their school. We also have a heap of feedback to go through now that will all filter down to making sure that PATH19 is even better!
Thanks again to everyone who attended PATH18, this is the sort of event that works because teachers commit their time to be part of those invaluable discussions that happen in session, over the lunch table, or in the car on the way back to the airport!
We also want to say thanks to all the Maths Pathway teachers who raised their hands to run sessions. We don’t want to do all the talking at these sorts of events, you are the ones on the ground doing all the amazing work, and spending what little extra time you have on preparing your awesome presentations is appreciated!
Here at Maths Pathway we’re always so thrilled to talk with teachers who are passionate and genuinely care about making their students lives better. We couldn’t do what we do without you!
See you all next year!
