Easing maths phobia among students

Jawaharlal Nehru Planetarium is hosting an exhibition to ease the fear of mathematics as a subject among students and adults. The exhibition, which began on Friday, will feature plenty of do-it-yourself maths projects, aimed at generating interest in the subject, even among those who hate it.

“This year is the International Year of Mathematics. So, we decided that it would be the perfect theme for the exhibition. Through hands-on activities, we wanted to make Mathematics not only easy, but also a fun exercise for students in the city,” said Dr BS Shylaja, director of the planetarium.

The exhibition features 25 experiments and projects based on mathematics, all of which are explained by high school students. “We (at the planetarium) made these projects, but sent out letters to schools in the city asking them for student volunteers. Based on that we chose who would explain the experiments to the visitors,” she added. The exhibition will conclude on Sunday.

For hundreds of students, teachers and parents who came for the exhibition had a walk-through about the projects that explain topics ranging from Pythagoras theorem to Binary numbers.
“Some of the projects teach students how one can do various tricks using Binary numbers and also the properties of a triangle. We made these experiments keeping high school students in mind,” Shylaja said.

The current exhibition will be among the two to be held this year on this subject. “Every year we conduct two such exhibitions, so the next one will be held in November. We have already sent out notices to schools about it,” she said.

However, though the second exhibition will also be about Mathematics, it will feature one key difference.

“This time around, we want the students themselves to make the projects. Now they have an idea of what kind of projects is expected from them, so hopefully they will come up with something really creative,” she said.