Einstein‘s hat, Plato‘s cave, Moebius’ strip and Tom Daley‘s Crochet: A mathematical Autoethnography

In our most recent lecture series, Ms Peak returned to the Latymer School to speak about her work at King‘s College and the research she has done into Maths and Education. In our Mathemagora (presentation of mathematical and educational ideas), we looked at tilings, philosophy, crochet and origami. Our aim was to answer the question: in what way does a teacher‘s reflection on mathematics facilitate change of practice? 

Through the allegory of Plato‘s cave (where people who were chained inside a cave could only interpret life through shadows), Ms Peak introduced the idea of embodied cognition. Researchers such as Alik Palatnik and Dor Abrahamson suggested that students should do things practically. Interestingly, by giving everything a physicality, difficult concepts become easier to understand - which we saw when we made antiprisms from paper. 

Ultimately, Ms Peak showed us a way of thinking about Maths that was innovative and grounded in the belief that education should expand our consciousness.