Every week at Rugby School Japan is busy, but with: Podiversity heats, an Open Morning, meetings for the residential trips as well as final rehearsals and five fantastic performances of the Junior and Senior productions taking place; some weeks even are busier than others.
This was no different in the Mathematics Department; alongside our usual: support, revision, society and club provisions this week; our End of Term Department Assessments took place at the beginning of the week and we ended the week with our House Mathematics competition with a few activities to celebrate π-day and the International Day of Mathematics.
The Mathematics Department, led by Mr Lee, was joined this year by Mr McNally and Mr Ransom with support from Ms Birds and Mr Rajendram. We deliver the Pearson Edexcel International A-Levels & IGCSEs curriculums in lessons and enter the UKMT Junior (May), Intermediate (January) & Senior (October) Mathematical Challenge to extend our students beyond the curriculum. We enjoyed huge success again in the UKMT IMC this term, with more than half of our pupils who took part in obtaining the gold certificates.
Our Mathematical Societies also provide an important opportunity for students to challenge themselves with different question style and problem solving activities and our Mathematics Scholars play an integral role in helping organise this. This year we have completed activities from a wide range of organisations including: UKMT, nRich, AoPS, the Royal Society and entered various JOI & JMO Olympiad competitions. Extension beyond the curriculum in Mathematics is akin to wider reading in English or History in it’s essential role in developing an affinity for the subject and a more general love of learning.
The weekly CCA Support Sessions enable students to seek assistance with Prep HW, or classwork to consolidate their understanding of the content covered in class and our Junior Stretch group have completed projects on different areas of mathematics that interest them personally. Once a week we also join the Prep HW session in houses on an evening to provide this level of support to our weekly and full boarders too.
Mathematics Club has focussed on Game Theory and the looking at the wider relevance of the psychology of zero sum games as well as implementing taught techniques in classic games of strategy. An understanding of Hawk-Dove scenarios are becoming as relevant in the wider world to day as they once were in the middle of the last century, when this area of Mathematics was exploding; and such approaches remain as cornerstones of finance, environmentalism and diplomacy.
As part of our International Day of Mathematics celebrations (March 14th), the students had the opportunity to recite π to as many digits as possible with every participant achieving 10 digits scoring a point for their house and those beating Mr McNally’s best effort receiving a merit. The best performance in each class and across the school scored additional points towards the Maths Week Trophy. With every point being valuable to the final standings we saw an increasingly eager student body desperate to participate for their houses.
Amazingly, six students achieved 100 digits with Ema (100) scoring best in Year 9 and Winnie (101) in Year 12 achieving an additional digit. An early entry of 115 digits from Sofiya was the best score in Year 12 and led the competition early – a particularly impressive effort given she was also retaining all her Shakespearean lines for the senior production at the same time. In Year 7 Juin managed an incredible 130 digits to score third best in the school with a late effort from Reo in Year 13 just scoring higher with 136 as he attempted to go for 200 and an overall win. Namami in Year 8 ultimately scored the largest total number of digits with a staggering total of 161 and the maximum points for Tudor. Most importantly was the number of students that volunteered to stand in front of their cohort and make their best attempt, all that took part should be commended!
Winnie, Ema, Jiun, Nanami & Sofiya who all scored over 100 digits of π
Students also had the opportunity to participate in the Tyres of Hanoi challenge, a variation of the infamous Towers of Hanoi problem that requires teamwork and strong leadership alongside the essential problem solving skills required.
The traditional version is a classic puzzle involving three pegs and a set of discs of different sizes. The objective is to move all discs from one peg to another, following three rules: only one disc can be moved at a time, a disc can only be placed on an empty peg or on a larger disc, and no disc may be placed on top of a smaller one. The minimum number of moves required to solve the puzzle is 2n−1, where n is the number of discs. The puzzle illustrates recursion and algorithmic problem-solving.
A perfect attempt in our version of the challenge would have required 31 tyre moves which brought an element of physicality into the challenge, especially as the challenge was against the clock with the quickest time winning and not the most efficient number of moves. The tyrese were numbered one to five as opposed to being of different sizes, so the challenge was also to ensure that no higher numbered tyre was placed on top of a lower numbered tyre. Students soon realised that there was then a mathematical element now introduced alongside the normally visual problem solving aspect, in that they could implement simple rules such as when the opportunity arises tyre one should always be placed on tyre four, etc.
After the Year 12 A-Level Mathematicians from School House opened the competition with a credible effort of 2 minutes 39 seconds; The Rupert Brooke girls in Senior Maths society took on the challenge later that Wednesday afternoon and delivered a strong performance to improve upon the boys time by over a minute achieving 1 minute 34 seconds.
This was the mark which would stand as best until Friday when the Year 13 School House A-Level boys stepped up to combine their wit and braun to set an ultimately unbeatable time of 1 minute 11 seconds and take the win for their house.
On Saturday The Year 8 Sheriff Boys proved that organisation and teamwork were essential with one leader instructing two pairs of boys which tyres to move and negating any physical disadvantage others might have thought they’d have, achieving the best time in Year 8 and the second best time overall of 1 minute and 17 seconds. The Year 7 Tudor girls employed similar tactics and managed 2 minutes 15 seconds, the best time in Year 7. The week ended with the Rupert Brooke and Tudor Girls competing for the best time in Year 9 with both teams over a minute quicker than the boys’ teams and the Tudor girls ensuring their win with a time of 1 minute and 52 seconds. This ensured that Tudor House would lead the House Mathematics Competition after the week’s events.
Thanks goes to all the students that took part in such good collaborative spirits, especially those who showed determination and resilience when all seemed to be going wrong. Thanks also goes to the Mathematics & House staff that supported the events and encouraged the students and administration team that sourced the all important tyres!
Kanako & Kaede watch on as Cocona instructs: Ema, Mika & Riana to their Year 9 win for Tudor
