During the ITSC conference in Sydney, I was fortunate enough to catch a glimpse of that rarest superhero out there – Maths Man. Normally an ordinary man, he rapidly changes into a protractor-wielding, multiplying hero, who can divide numbers faster than a speeding bullet!

Check him out here, but don’t ask me for his identity – it’s top secret:http://mathsmantv.wordpress.com/

My personal favourite is when he helps out in the office.

Seriously, though, what a brilliant idea for keeping kids excited about Mathematics. All it takes is a few teachers thinking outside the box, and with a bit of energy and a willingness to dress up in ridiculous costumes. Sure beats the heck out of the traditional maths classroom, I bet. Congratulations to the staff at OLOR Kellyville.

What’s next? His trusty sidekick – Calculator Girl?

Ha!

For those of you who haven’t seen the ads, Maths Online is an online (as you might expect) maths program published by McDonalds Australia. It was devised by a mathematics teacher, I believe, but it was picked up by McDonalds Australia and offered FREE of charge to every school in Australia last year. There was even an advertising campaign on TV. I’ve looked for the ads on Youtube, but no dice. Below is the link to the official website: http://www.mathsonline.com.au/

According to that same website, more than 580 000 students now have access to Maths Online. Now you might be thinking, isn’t that great? It’s wonderful to see the big multinational putting a little bit back into the community.

Or is it?

The link below goes to an article written by Andrew Hickey, who suggests that there might be an ulterior motive – after all, do we really want to place our youth’s education in the hands of an organisation who only wants them to be able to count the number of meal deals that have been ordered?’