Math Power!

mEducation Alliance Signature Activity

The goal of Math Power! The Power of Math in Everyday Life is to inspire kids, particularly those in developing countries — and both in- and out-of-school — to joyfully engage with math via low-cost tech and non-tech interventions.

Math Power! is intended as a fun and provocative way to showcase global efforts, celebrate the efforts of local math champions and organizations, and to catalyze new activities to reach learners wherever they are. We want to help share the love of math as something which should be entertaining and meaningful regardless of the circumstances.

Our current interventions include:

Math Power! Community of Practice (CoP) – This is a diverse network of global math champions (e.g., individuals and institutions) helping to bring the joy of math to learners around the world. For over 3 years, we have hosted quarterly dialogues on a range of topics. See the CoP members further down on this page and reach out to us if you’d like to join. (Also, see our CoPs on Literacy and Educational Volunteerism.)
Identifying global, regional and national champion math-focused organizations, particularly those engaged in lower-resource settings
Global Symposia – We have featured presentations from many exciting math organizations during our annual Symposia. See below for those who presented at our 2023 Symposium, 2022 Symposium, and 2021 Symposium. Also check out our Pulse Media FLN Video Showcase page from our 2021 Symposium on these themes.
IVR Dissemination Platform for Math Games – A collaboration with Save the Children, Peripheral Vision International, Viamo, and others supported by 2 years of grants from Cisco Foundation (see below for more information).
Math and Educational Storytelling Games – We’ve developed a series of branching narrative stories for teachers to introduce to learners around basic mathematical concepts described in the Global Proficiency Framework for Mathematics.
Development of Math Game Catalogs– A prior collaboration with Education Above All.
Math Power! Prize (an international numeracy prize!) – Launched March 14, 2022 (Pi Day), in collaboration with Save the Children, Hempel Foundation, and Amplify. We are looking for 2024 sponsors!
Math Game Youth Ambassadors – A 2024 initiative designed to engage young people training other young people in math games. Contact us for more information.
Other Matchmaking/Networking Math Power! Events

Want to join us in any/all of the activities, please feel free to e-mail us medalliance@meducationalliance.org.

Help Spread the Love of Math Worldwide by Financially Supporting Math Power!

Co-sponsor the 2024 Math Power! Prize

The Math Power! Prize, part of our suite of Math Power! activities, is designed to draw attention to the importance of mathematics and numeracy skills and to publicly recognize the amazing work of exceptional organizations working in their communities and globally to promote the joy of math.

We want to turn this into an annual award and are looking for co-sponsors for the 2024 Math Power! Prize call.

Interested? Please email us at medalliance@meducationalliance.org

Learn more about the Prize here.

Math Power! Community of Practice:

Interested in joining the Math Power! Community of Practice? Please email us at medalliance@meducationalliance.org.

Learn from our Math Power! Community

January 2024

Topic: Math Olympiads

Presenter: Martin Mungai, ICT National Trainer, CEMASTEA

October 2023

Topic: Refugee Led Learning and Impact

Presenter: Vinod Lobo, CEO and Founder, Learning Upgrade

July 2023

Topic: AI in Education

Presenters: Scott Kim, Puzzle Master and Founder, Math Monday and Cathy Carter, STEM Data and Statistics Specialist, PhET

Math Organizations Featured at mEducation Alliance Symposia

We have featured some terrific math-focused organizations at our prior Symposia.

2023 mEducation Alliance Symposia

Darsel; Darsel: Scaling math learning through WhatsApp chatbot; Abdulhamid Haidar, Founder & CEO

EIDU; Using Technology to Transform Education in Resource Limited Settings; Nina Bolte, Chief Learning Officer.

FUNDAPROMAT; FUNDAPROMAT: Spreading the Joy of Mathematics; Jeanette Shakalli, Executive Director

Learning Equality; Achieving FLN Competencies through Tech-Enabled, Project Based Learning in Low-Internet Contexts; Laura Danforth, Head of Global Community Engagement

mEducation Alliance: Interactive Voice Response (IVR) Dissemination Platform for Math Games in Households in Rwanda; Anthony Bloome, Executive Director (mEducation Alliance); Paul Falzone, Executive Director (Peripheral Vision International); and Scott Nicholson, Professor (Wilfrid Laurier University-virtual)

onebillion; Developing effective EdTech for marginalized children to acquire foundational numeracy: insights from Malawi’s nationwide BEFIT programme; Nat Dinham, Partnerships Lead

Reflective Learning; Bridging the Gap: Taking the Fight to Learning Loss; Eugene Pelteret, Co-founder and COO

The Global Math Circle; Math circles provide deep understanding of mathematics to all; Tifin Calcagni, Education Director

talkSTEM; Designing Learning Extensions to Math Walks to Maximize Learning Outcomes for All Children; Benjamin Feinstein, Program Director

University of Nottingham; Using mobile technologies to support the acquisition of basic mathematics with children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities; Nicola Pitchford, Professor

Youcubed at Stanford University; Mathematical Mindsets as Key to Futures in STEM; Jack Dieckmann, Director of Research, youcubed

Youth Impact; ConnectEd: Evidence on the Effectiveness of Phone-Based Tutoring Programming to Support Basic Learning Competencies; Colin Crossley, Program Manager (ConnectEd)

2022 mEducation Alliance Symposium (themed Wondrous Learning is…!) – See the math presentations in our Wondrous Learning is A-B-C and 1-2-3! track. You can find associated slide decks on our event page and teaser videos from some of these organizations on the event playlist page on our Pulse Media Channel. At this event, we also showcased the work of several of our 2022 Math Power Prize winners and semi-finalists, including talkSTEM, onebillion, CAUSE Canada, and Prison Mathematics Project.

2021 mEducation Alliance Symposium (themed: EdTech for Accelerating Foundational Literacy and Numeracy in Low-Resource Contexts). – We featured many math organizations as part of our Math Power! sessions during this Symposium. You can find the presentation recordings on our Foundational Literacy and Numeracy Video Showcase page, as well as pre-recorded presentations from various Math Power! Champions

Math Power! Explorer Supported by Cisco Global Grant

Research indicates that children in developing countries are not learning sufficient mathematical skills for the rapidly evolving 21st century. With two years of seed funding from Cisco Systems Global Impact Cash Grants and partnership with Viamo, Save the Children, Peripheral Vision International, Wilfrid Laurier University, and AIMS-Rwanda, the mEducation Alliance’s Math Power! Explorer (MPE) pilot combines mobile phones and Interactive Voice Recognition (IVR) with household and parental engagement to support easy delivery of math games and activities to support primary-aged grade students in Rwanda.

After developing, testing and deploying this minimal viable product in the summer and early Fall of 2022, there have been over 16,000 unique parent and children users playing the 4 IVR games an average of 10 times. In 2024, we are piloting MPE 2.0 with the addition of adventure-style branching story narratives based on math skills (e.g., percentages, fractions, ratios) identified in the Global Proficiency Framework in Mathematics. Our plan is to scale IVR tool use for learners in multiple grade levels by developing an engaging repository of math (and other subjects) game content paired with formal M&E assessments. We also have formed a community with like-minded organizations using lower-end mobile application features (e.g., WhatsApp).

You can read an early blog about this activity HERE (June 30th, 2022) and see a project summary report (November 30, 2022) HERE.

Want more information, including how to partner with us on this initiative? Please email us at medalliance@meducationalliance.org.

Math Game Catalog

The Math Games catalog is a solution meant to help learners practice math fluency, building confidence, and gaining important problem-solving skills by applying math in different contexts. The catalog was a joint creation of Education Above All as part of their Internet Free Education Resource Bank (IFERB) project-based learning resources, the mEducation Alliance’s Math Power! initiative and supported by the Julia Robinson Math Festival. The games are designed for 4 levels of learners from the ages of 4 – 14 years based on a competency framework. Each of the games is fun, requires a low amount of resources, and is implementable in or out of school contexts.

The resources available include:

A briefing note with the background and design choices
A competency framework based on Khan Academy’s Common Core learning principles
Detailed math games for each level that are ready to play
A backend resource catalog that is a curated and categorized repository of existing open-source math resources

EAA, JRMF, and the mEducation Alliance would appreciate feedback on this tool, so email innovations@eaa.org.qa. with any suggestions or tools beyond what is published.