Talking Maths in Public Podcast - Episode 6: More books, a life-changing experience and The Theorem We Attribute To Pythagoras Full transcript Katie: Welcome to the TMIP podcast, the community podcast for members of the Talking Maths in Public network. TMIP is a UK network for people who communicate maths in different ways, and we have a conference every two years. a WhatsApp chat, and a podcast, which you're listening to now. My name's Katie Steckles, and I'm a mathematician, maths communicator, and TMIP organizer. The podcast is a chance for members of the community to share their maths communication work and talk about the ways we communicate maths. In this episode, we'll be hearing the second part of our interview with author Rob Eastaway, talking about his latest book on the maths of Shakespeare, his favourite puzzles, and how to get maths across the curriculum. We'll also hear from Alison Eves at the Royal Institution, who's been training sixth formers to deliver maths masterclasses to primary students. And to finish, we'll hear how maths education researcher Lucy Rycroft-Smith has been contributing their approach to learning to Will Marler's Learn With Will animated videos. To see links to the things discussed in this podcast, and find more episodes, you can visit talkingmathsinpublic.uk/podcast. In episode 5, we heard the first part of an interview between maths authors Colin Beveridge and Rob Eastaway. In this second part, we'll hear more about Rob's work, his favorite maths puzzles and upcoming projects. --- Colin: So your latest book is much to do about numbers, about the maths of Shakespeare. Tell us how that came about. It's a bit of a. Diversion from your usual fare. Rob: Yeah, absolutely. Who would write a book about maths and Shakespeare? Two years ago, I certainly wouldn't. It wouldn't, why, as various people have asked me, why would anyone do this? And the answer is serendipity. The fact that the Maths Association happened to have their annual conference in Stratford upon Avon, turned out to be the spark that led to a, what's been a fabulous project. Andrew Jeffery, who some people listening will know, and I, have a tradition occasionally of doing workshops together. So I said to Andrew, why don't we theme it on Shakespeare since we're in Stratford? And he said, yeah, why not? And we did. Brainstormed ideas and it was all superficial stuff. He, one of his was Henry the V or Henry the 20%, as he is better known. That was one of the but we were talking about the maths of love triangles and things like that. But but anyway I thought I better just do a bit of research, do some word searches. in Shakespeare for maths words. One of the early discoveries, he never uses the word triangle, despite that being the basis of many of his plots. But he does use words like arithmetic and division. And he talks about addition and does all sorts of arithmetical calculations. And the more I dug, the more I just discovered he's absolutely His work is immersed with number play, but also he was surrounded by some of the most interesting maths developments in history. They just happened to be going on at the same time. Probability was taking off, and he was in real time, he was playing games where people were, in behind the scenes trying to work out what the chances were of doing it. Astronomy was taking off. The switch from old modal music to, to modern major minor music was happening, and that's all very mathematical. So it's been a serendipitous project, really but it's tapped into something I've been interested in for a long time, which is we all like to connect maths with other things, because we all know it's connected to everything, but typically it gets connected to the STEM subjects, and I was really interested in connecting it to the humanities, particularly history, because history is my other favourite subject and this is a vehicle for that and Shakespeare. I'm not a Shakespeare person, particularly more than the average person is, but I'm much more of one now because I've read so much more of it. But and so I've, yeah I'm been talking to all sorts of Shakespearean experts in researching this. And it's just not an audience I would ever have been speaking to before. So it's wonderful to have that excuse actually. Colin: Brilliant stuff. Now, you've recently handed over the reins as Puzzles Editor at New Scientist, and you've been involved in several collections of puzzle books. What's your favourite puzzle, and what makes it good? Rob: Ah, before saying that, I'm so thrilled that Katie Steckles picked up the baton on New Scientist, and New Scientist has become a fantastic focal point for recreational maths. There's now the Weekly Puzzle, and the Monthly Maths of Puzzles. Everyday life column from Peter Rowlett and Kate Steckle. So that is brilliant news because we've been missing that since Martin Gardner Stopped doing things for Scientific American, but in terms of puzzles Yeah, I was asked back to new scientists would I revive the column and I said to them only if The puzzles are allowed to be fun, and the kind of thing that everyone would quite like is reading the puzzle, even if they can't solve it, as opposed to some of the really arcane things that had been going out in New Scientist 20 years ago. Yeah, so many puzzles to choose from, and a lot of them, again, are visual, or not done instantly, or, not good for radio, and effectively we're in radio format here. But! I think the category of puzzles that's given me most intrigue and most conversation over the years come down to the simple notion, for example, I've got a bag here which has got three counters in it. Two sides one counter is black on both sides, one's red on both sides, and one's black and red. And I reach in and pull out a counter and look at one side and it's red. What's the chance that the other side is also red? red. And the notion, hang on a sec, okay, so it's either the red and black counter or it's the red counter, so it's 50 50, and actually the answer is, it's a two thirds chance it's got red on the other side. So that is just one, of course, you will immediately recognize these chances actually a third. That's also the Monty Hall problem. It's also the boy girl problem and everything else. And those have given me so much content over the years, so many hours of debate, so many often frustration because of people miss stating the puzzle or whatever, but it's really got me into deep conversations with some seriously mathematical people. So I've loved that for the insights it's given me into it. both probability and how people misrepresent it and misinterpret it and everything else. Yes, there we go. And the nice thing about that puzzle, which, I've given to people in real time or it's Monty Hall equivalent, is the way of demonstrating to people what the true answer is, can be to simply do a bet. Say, okay, we're going to do best 10 and whoever wins, the other one buys him a drink. And that's a really good way. Cause I remember with one friend, him, so as I was like leading by six to four or whatever, and he could see where it was going. He said, Oh, okay. Okay. He still bought me the drink, but Colin: There's a lovely story of I think Paul Erdős didn't believe the Monty Hall thing until he saw a simulation. Rob: Yeah. Colin: Yeah. Rob: So many, I still know a couple of math people who will say to me, I still don't believe it. I still, and I say it is a thing you can test. You can just replicate it by, doing it in real time. But I have versions of Monty Hall that I do with undergraduates. Who all know the answer is you should swap, but you can present it and word it slightly differently and it sounds much the same, but actually such that, I almost win almost every time because they swap. But but, or anyway they get confused. So it's a sort of a, one of those, a little learning can be a dangerous thing. You should really understand what you should express the problem. correctly and understand why you're making the decision you're making. Colin: Okay, the details are important. Rob: Yes. Colin: Okay what are you working on next? What's on your plates? Rob: I don't have any new book projects in mind. I'm not, I don't do books for the sake of but the Shakespeare book, so the Much Ado About Numbers has opened up a whole new area that I really want to explore, which is how to get maths across the curriculum, how to collaborate, especially with English and history teachers. And, my dream would be to have teacher conferences where English and maths teachers are in the same room, listening to the same talk and getting material out and looking at ways of collaborating. And likewise, history teachers, because there's so much interesting history of maths to be had. And it, Maths plays a significant part in history. There's the maths of history and the history of maths. They're both interesting and I think history teachers don't really know about that very much. Colin: So I know Tom Briggs is very interested in getting more maths into museums or letting museums see the maths that's already there. Rob: Yes, absolutely. So really that is in the back of my mind as a project this year is our 20th anniversary of Maths Inspiration. So all those shows, and we're going to do hopefully a special show in London to mark pretty much exactly 20 years since the first show. So lots of things on the go, but definitely ways of reaching out into new audiences that are outside this maths bubble, there's a whole range of bubbles on there. There's the ones who are, totally obsessed by maths, but there are other who are typically reachable because they used to like maths and they've got out to get back into it. But the ultimate challenge is to reach that general public who wouldn't who the very notion of the word maths just makes the want to run away. How do you ever engage them. And they are reachable, but it's a totally different art. Yes. Colin: Thanks. And so if people want to get in touch with you, what's the, where can they find you? Rob: I have a website. It's easiest: robeastway.com or on Twitter, as I still call it. That tends to be, I still stick with that as the easiest medium to reach the most people, for all its flaws. And yeah, those two really. Yeah. And I'm always happy to- and mathsinspiration.com will let you find out about the shows, which are free for teachers and maths communicators too. We have no formal rule, but basically if if you're someone who would like to come to a show as a guest, you email us - Maths Inspiration, then mostly we'll be able to accommodate you and you can come watch a show for free. Or in some cases, be a presenter. We're always on the lookout for fresh- especially youthful voices to bring a new angle to to maths communication. Colin: Terrific stuff. Rob Eastaway, thank you so much for taking the time to talk with me. Rob: Thank you. --- Katie: Links to all of Rob's projects mentioned are in the show notes. Next up, I chatted to Alison Eves from the Royal Institution about their Masterclass programme and a project to get sixth formers involved in delivering workshops to primary school children. --- Katie: I'm talking to Alison Eves from the Royal Institution who's here to tell us a bit about their Masterclass projects and their Sixth Form to Primary project. So hi, Alison. Alison: Oh, hi, Katie. Thanks for having me. Katie: So first of all, tell us a bit about yourself and the RI and the Masterclasses. Alison: Okay my background is that I'm a secondary maths teacher, and I got involved with the Royal Institution Masterclasses as a volunteer for them, running masterclasses, which I'll say a bit more about in a moment, in my school. What happens at a masterclass is you bring together pupils from different schools, and they get to experience some to do some hands on maths from beyond the curriculum so that's the idea is that it's inspirational and it's not an acceleration project it's the idea is that people just get to see the wonder the breadth, the depth things that maybe people don't think of as maths. I don't agree with maths by stealth, by the way, but but there's just so people opening people's eyes to the wonder and and yeah, it's just the sheer diversity of the things that we call maths. And I work on, for the Royal Institution masterclasses started with 13 and 14 year olds, year nines. But then and that was back in the 1980s and then around 2000, they expanded to primary pupils and that's the part of the network that I work on. So around the country in a year, we would have about 70 or 80 different series, different groups meeting and enjoying some maths together. Katie: Yeah. And I imagine that people will be familiar with the sort of year nine masterclasses because they're the ones that you hear the most stuff about, but yeah, there is also this sort of primary section. So that's, is it year six? Alison: Yeah. Year five, we, mostly it's top primary. So sometimes year six is take part as well, but that's the idea is that as people reach that age. So that'll be Katie: Age nine and 10. Alison: Yeah, that's right. And they're very open to the wonder. Because they're coming from my background of teaching teenagers who might think that what I was showing them was wonderful, but it wasn't cool to say so. It is absolute delight to work with these primary age children who will go, wow. Katie: Yeah, that, that is essentially what I found. I've done a few primary masterclasses myself. And the main thing I've found was that they're very much up for whatever you suggest. You're like, this is what we're doing today. And they're like, cool, great, tell us more about this thing. And in the way that some teenagers might be a bit more aloof and a bit more go on, then you've got to impress me. They are very much just what's the thing point me at some stuff and I'll do it. Yeah. Alison: Yeah, they're really open to I guess maybe as you get older, you get a bit more cynical about or at least it's a real thing, but they're usually most primary children will go along with what you're telling them. Obviously, I'm not trying to tell them something that's not true. And yeah, and we'll just be very open to the experience. Katie: Yeah, and I guess that's a crucial age as well. It's when they're thinking about their relationship with maths and science, and deciding what they're, what they want to be when they grow up, potentially. So it's a really nice time to work with them. Alison: It is because I think sometimes before people have got to secondary school, they've decided whether they're a mathematician or not, which is really sad, because I think everyone's a mathematician. But so we're just trying to make sure that People get that opportunity. And in the same, I think you're missing out on part of life in the same way as if you don't encounter art, if we just don't treat maths as in the same way, I don't think there's this fear factor for some reason. So yeah, really important that before we get to being afraid, we can see how beautiful maths is. Katie: Yeah, and I guess it's lots of fun activities as well, like lots of creative and mathematical ideas and playing with things and hands on stuff and that sort of thing. They're not necessarily just sat down writing equations for the whole day. Alison: No, it's to yeah, discover and try and discover things for yourself as far as possible. Obviously, you've got a masterclass. speaker or leader who is guiding what's happening and offering activities that will allow you to encounter whatever it is we're exploring in depth. And typically you'd have an hour and a half or two hours with this group of children and that is enough time to get to something quite deep even though they're young. But they've been chosen by their schools as people with an interest. They might not necessarily be the highest attainers, although often they are very high attaining, but it could just be the person who's interested. Because that's the key thing is that you want to know and you want to explore, but yeah. Katie: So the masterclass presenter that you mentioned, the person delivering the masterclass, like who would that normally be? Alison: So traditionally with the year nine masterclasses, that would have been someone from maybe a university lecturer, maybe someone from industry, maybe a maths enthusiast who has a topic that they'd like to share. Yeah. And that is still the case often for the younger children. But a few years ago, we started this program where we are training younger people who are still students themselves to deliver masterclasses. So that's been a whole new strand for the RI and it's been really powerful and quite magical as well. It's very popular. It now represents over half of all primary masterclasses that we give are given by young speakers rather than. People who are already in, working in industry or academia Katie: or wherever. Okay, so it's called the sixth form to primary masterclass. I guess the sixth form is 18 year olds who are just about to go off to university. They're just finishing off school. I guess they're, so they're learning how to deliver the masterclasses and going into the primary schools and working with the kids. Alison: Yeah. So what happens is actually more often 16 and 17 year olds are like, as they're going into sixth form, because I guess by the time they get to being 17, 18, they're very focused on their own exam. Absolutely. Yep. Katie: Yep. Alison: More often at the beginning of their sixth form experience. It's an enrichment activity for them and it's a chance for them to try some science communication. And the Royal Institution, we will go in and spend half a day with a group of six formers, usually about 12 or 15 six formers. And we would give them some skills, talk to them about what a masterclass is and how to put it together. We've got some generic activities that, that would for them to understand. And then, yeah, they can. They can either use we've got some ready made master classes that are on our website that teachers can use. So the six forms can deliver one of those, but I would say, 95 percent of the time, they want to do their own thing. And that is really key. I think for having a really high quality. Experience for the primary children because the, for me, the key thing about masterclasses, you should do a masterclass on something that you're excited about and that you've got to share. And so allowing the sixth formers that, that freedom to, to choose a topic. So for example, I had a girl say to me, I'm going to do a masterclass on chaos theory. You're going to do chaos theory with these nine and 10 year olds. And she said no. And she had an idea about how she was going to introduce it. And it is a masterclass. So it's not like teaching an A level where you're going to have to answer, you have to understand everything and be able to put it together. It's giving people a glimpse. So yeah, she did this. She put this wonderful masterclass together. And showed people what chaos theory was in broadest terms, and I'm sure it'll have been inspiring for the children that encountered that. So yeah they get to put together their master class and we give them some help and they get some mentoring from their teachers within school as well, so because we're just delivering half a day and then we're there to help but obviously we're not there every day Katie: and I imagine that's actually fantastic for the students because they, you have to understand the topic to be able to communicate it, but also it's a good way to develop their kind of communication skills and their presenting and their working with with younger students as well. Yeah. Alison: Yeah. It's quite a challenge. But that we have found they really enjoy it as well. They do find it's difficult, but then in some senses. Katie: Don't we all? Alison: Yeah. Yeah. And it is good for their own. We all know that when we try and teach something, then you really have to unpick and find out the bits you don't quite understand and tease those out. Yeah, that works really well for them from their own education. And we've got some lovely anecdotal stories of how much people have enjoyed it and how they've been able to speak about the experience at interviews or on application forms. And Has, it's for some people, it has been life changing, not to like over egg it, but for a few people and and the primary children is something very magical because there's such great role models because they're only a few years older than the primary children that in a different way to relating to an adult who's excited about the maths, I think the primary children can imagine that they might be like this one day and not too far away. They can actually imagine. So there's something quite special about it. Katie: Yeah, that's fantastic. So you run training sessions with the sixth formers and what kind of stuff do you teach them? Is it, you said you gave them some example things to work through. Do you train them in how to present well, or is it just a natural? Alison: Yeah, there's a little bit of presentation skills. So we, doing like a fun activity where they get to talk about, ketchup or mayo, or if you could only eat one food for the rest of the life, what would you eat? Or, these sort of like quite quirky things. But yeah, talking for a few seconds about this, and just letting them have the experience of leading. Within the training, so they get a little bit about presentation skills, a little bit about being at the front of a room and leading that room, a bit about how to teach a practical skill, which is quite different to academic knowledge. So don't hand out the scissors until you've told them what they're cutting. Yep. And things like that. So just like very, then we're getting very nitty gritty here, but some practical skills, but also, and I think they're quite transferable skills as well that you'd be able to use in various situations. And I know they really enjoy doing this sort of exercises, and then putting it all together. And then, often the first masterclass of the series from the primary schools. Children's point of view will be delivered by an experienced speaker, and ideally the sixth formers would come and act as helpers at that point before they deliver themselves because then they will see a whole masterclass run, which they because masterclasses are relatively scarce resource, not that many people will have experienced the masterclass themselves. before they deliver one. So that's really good. And also they get to see how smart these children are and what great questions they ask, even though they're nine or 10. And that's often what happens at the end of the session. You say, Oh, do you want to ask anything? I say, Oh, they're really smart. I think I need to go and, they can say they can tweak what they've got prepared. So that, I think that's really good from Making sure there's a high quality product and that everybody's confident, they've not been put in a position where they suddenly faced with this class of very bright nine year olds who are asking difficult questions, and they weren't, they're not ready. Katie: Yeah, that is just absolutely fantastic to hear about because I guess. You say things like, I wish this stuff was available when I was young. I wish this was available when I was in sixth form, because I think I would have really loved to get involved with something like this. And I'm guessing this is also potentially going to be a way to bring some new maths communicators into the field, Alison: yeah, that's very exciting. You get that chance to give it a try and know that's a possible career as well. Katie: Yeah. Yeah. Wonderful. So if people want to find out more about this, I guess if they head to the RI website, there's stuff about the masterclasses on there. Alison: There will be. Yep. And they can drop us an email. I'd love to tell you more if people would like to get involved as we need adult speakers or if they would like to know more about getting a group of young people involved. That'll be good. Katie: And we'll drop some links in the show notes as well, so people can find that. Thank you very much, Alison. Alison: My pleasure. Thank you very much. --- Katie: And for our last segment, we'll hear from Will Marler, whose Learn With Will YouTube channel covers English maths and science. They engaged the services of maths education expert Lucy Rycroft-Smith to help with some of their maths videos, and we invited them both to chat about how that went. Will: Hi, I'm Will Marler. I'm an animator working in SciComm and MathsComm, and I also produce my own series of educational videos called Learn With Will. One of the things that I really wanted to do with Learn With Will is not just use the same old teaching techniques that people have been used to over the years. I wanted to innovate and take new approaches to certain subjects, which brings me on to my co host, Lucy Rycroft-Smith. Lucy: Thank you so much. I'm here representing the boring, tired, old, traditional teaching methods that Will just mentioned. Not really, but I certainly have, I think, probably used those in my time as a teacher. So I used to be a maths teacher. teacher, and now I work as a researcher at the University of Cambridge, but I also do quite a lot of work on designing things, all sorts of things mostly trying to use research and evidence to make things better, which is quite a wide remit really. Will: So yeah, like I say, I do my video series Learn With Will teaching science, English and maths, and I'm an animator first before I'm a sort of science communicator, so I don't have any science, maths or English. qualifications passed for maths and science. It's GCSE. And then for English it's A level. So I always like to bring people on to help plug the gaps that I have in certain topics. And so I reached out on the TMIP WhatsApp group to find someone for a video for the Pythagoras theorem. And Lucy responded to the request and actually, It took Learn With Will in a totally different direction that helped me innovate and approach the topics differently. So I remember I did, I remember my first script was probably very much, here's the Pythagoras theorem, it's a squared plus b squared equals c squared, and you were like, There's so much more foundation we have to build first. Do you remember what sort of things you suggested? I do. Lucy: Just before I answer that question I had a bit of a flabbergasted face a minute ago, listeners, which I'm sure you can imagine, because I genuinely didn't know that you would describe yourself as being, as you just did, the kind of science and maths communicator second, and that you didn't feel qualified, whatever actually qualification means, because I think you're an extraordinary maths and science communicator, and you do an amazing job, and so much of what you've done on these videos has challenged my thinking about maths education and how to teach maths, so don't do yourself a service. It's what I'm saying. Yeah, I think Pyth I don't know what to call it Will, the Pythagorean theorem, which is a lie anyway the theorem we attribute to Pythagoras, there you go, how about that the theorem that we, which we mistakenly attribute to Pythagoras is very easy to it's a running joke isn't it's a running joke, everyone who hates maths, AKA more than half the population, apparently, will say, Oh, not all that rubbish. Oh, it's all that Pythagoras and stuff. Oh, it's all that stuff I don't use and don't care about. Whoever uses Pythagoras's theorem! I hear that a lot and I think it's a running joke for a reason because it can feel very abstract and also it's got that kind of catchy little formula that means almost nothing unless you see it visually or laid out in some kind of, useful way. Will: But because of the way it was taught it's probably still hanging around in the sort of dark corners of someone's brain. And they can recall a squared plus b squared equals c squared and are frustrated with the fact that they can recall it but have Seemingly no need to in date exactly that Lucy: and also it's just a funny word I will say that when I was teaching maths, I was pregnant twice and each time I had a very Successful running gag with my students that I was going to call the baby pythagoras, which they Always thought was hilarious for some reason. Anyway, so I think starting with a formula for me always feels wrong, because a formula for me is an expression of a relationship, and that expression of a relationship comes from a deep understanding of when that relationship works, when it doesn't, why it holds, why it doesn't hold, what's a kind of good example of it, what's a non example, what might be an example, if we had certain conditions, there's all that kind of work. And so when I saw this script I thought, we could actually try and do that in a really interesting way here, which is why the stuff about the square and standing at the corner versus the edge of the square came in because I'm a mathematical artist and I genuinely use that idea all the time and it's slightly counterintuitive, even to me as a mathematician, that if I stood at the corner of the square versus if I stood in the middle of one of the edges of the square, I'd be, much further away, much being a, some kind of quantifiable thing from the centre, and that for me is a lovely beginning to starting to understand that relationship. Will: Yeah, so I remember you suggesting something along the lines of let's imagine we're at a concert, and there's people on the stage, and having two people, one at the sort of corner of the stage and one at the edge of the stage, and exploring the idea that the person at the edge of the stage is in fact slightly closer than the person at the corner of the stage. And I took that and turned it into Like a sort of Indiana Jones style story where we're exploring the temple of Pythagoras and we find this blank scroll and the secrets of the Pythagorean theorem will be revealed to the person who is standing closest to the temple. to the scroll. Stand at the corner and assert that I don't, I cannot understand how you could possibly be any closer. And then you stand at the edge and then it reveals it to you and you, then we start with a why is that the case? And so then it sets up this interesting, there's a, there's an in universe, in narrative reason for us to even be talking about Pythagorean theorem. And We build it up from there, and then even after that's been established, it's not like we go straight into the theorem like you say before. We set up the really lovely diagram that nicely demonstrates that, when you square, and we also explain what to square something means, when you make a square out of the lengths, the shorter lengths of a right angle triangle, You can chop up the area of that square and combine them together to create the square that is made from the hypotenuse. And also introducing the word hypotenuse. And I remember you saying that we should comment on the fact that's actually quite a funny word as well. So it's, and I think this is something that I've been so keen to to do, it's really, it really, our approach to that, and specifically your approach to that, really helped to enforce this idea that I had of wanting to have a bit more of a fresh take on certain topics or establish having that same that same Thank you. way of going about it where establishing a scenario in which I need to understand a certain topic and not just then going straight in with what the definition of that is, but building it up from the foundational elements for us. And that's obviously very much what. As part of your research of how, you should teach maths is something that obviously you've got masses of experience in. Lucy: Yeah this concept is really nicely encapsulated by Dan Meyer who says, if maths is the aspirin, what's the aspirin? That's the approach. I really enjoy that as a concept. And for me, it's, for me, it's slightly differently formulated, which is I'm a really terrible amateur actor. And so I like to ask myself in a very grandiose manner, what's my motivation, which feels the same sort of thing. Like why should I care about this? And I think, as you say having it grounded in context and something interesting really does help. I will also put a quick note in here that we definitely talked about this at the time. I remember having some qualms about the context, as you say, that kind of Indiana Jones style context because of the specter of, white people colonialism, robbing the earth of all of its treasures, trampling all over. Indigenous culture and having lots of discussions about that at the time. Do you recall that as well? Will: Yeah, definitely. So there was a sort of a shot where the bust of Pythagoras was something that I you know, we together, we grabbed and replaced with the sack of coins type, typical Indiana Jones sort of thing and you push back on that, I think rightly and and then we instead use that shot to question the whole notion of calling it Pythagorean Theorem by Bye. Having the bust of Pythagoras alongside these male and female presenting busts that are of somewhat, anonymous people that would have definitely discovered it before Pythagoras. And that goes into a longer discussion about whether maths is discovered or invented or anything like that as well. But yeah and I think that's something that. Again, influence my other videos that even non maths videos like the the things about the periodic table and things like that. I'm actually working on one about GPS, how GPS works. And I do a little thing speaking about Dr. Gladys West, who did a lot of the mathematics behind how GPS works. And as a, as a black woman, not at all. I say remembered, she's still with us, but not thought about as much of a trailblazer as she definitely should be. Absolutely. Lucy: And I noticed how you named her as Doctor there, which is also a very common thing in the way that we speak about people. If we talk about white men, quite often we use their professional titles. Whereas generally, we often forget to use people's professional titles or value them or credit them when they're not white men. And I see, I recognise you doing that very intentionally. Absolutely. Will: And similarly with a video that I did called every single element where myself and Dr. Suze Kundu did a sort of 30 second fact file on all 118 elements. One of the facts that we said for each element was the sort of, the discoverer. And a lot of these the majority being, white men tended to have these, titles that I personally have qualms with, things like Sir, and Lord, and all those sort of things. And I decided to make the decision to not include those. And that was a personal decision, and that's obviously loaded with my own views and things like that. At the end of the day, it was I don't know, it felt right to just strip those titles. Unnecessarily loaded titles, and I'm sure, depending on who you ask, I'm sure there'll be plenty of people listening that think that's, no, this is not at all how, and that's, I'm sure there's plenty of good reasoning behind, why that is, it should have been kept, but again, it was something I've wanted to possibly challenge the the way in which we refer to certain people again, based on my own personal preference. Lucy: And that's interesting because it continues the theme of your work, which is we've always done things a certain way. And it's really easy in teaching to teach the way that you were taught or use the methods and the tools and the metaphors that, your mentor or your coach or a teacher that you've watched used. And The ability to and the courage to stop and say, what if we did it like this is clearly a facet of your work and carrying it through, not just to the mathematical and the science content, but also exactly as you say in your approach, these people have unearned titles, let's call it what it is. And perhaps we could not use them. And that's a very intentional choice. And as you say, whether people agree or disagree, you're designing intentionally there, you're paying attention to every word. And I have to tell you how much I really appreciate that approach. Will: Yeah, thank you. And the great thing about animating, and as you were very kindly saying, animating and writing and creating with intention, is that it's a very purposeful process in which I can go, okay this is what I'd maybe write, but actually I've got the time and the ability to change it, to Research and to edit and to play around with these things If I was doing something off the top of my head, I probably possibly wouldn't necessarily be able to come up with Certain examples, but I can actually stop and go. Okay. Let's actually think is this the right, you know Is this the same example that everyone else uses or is this the same method or they're meeting people like lucy who go actually let's maybe you could do it like this And at the end of the day, you weren't a client or a boss or anything that was telling me how to do it. It was very much I think we should do it like this. And we would write a script together that was. Based in that intentional approach and also that somewhat disruptive approach, disruptive is lovely. Lucy: And, two things just struck me as you were speaking there. One was this intentional design, this attempt to, I guess in research terms we'd call it, break the hegemonic ways of doing things, the sort of traditional we've always done it this way, is potentially, might be a lost art in our new age of generative AI, because what happens there is, everything gets recycled and churned and you get this data cannibalism effect, and to some extent, we're only in the beginning stages, but we might end up in a situation where just old ideas go round and round until everything is grey which would be very sad. But the second thing that occurred to me, and I'm going to talk about my identity just for a moment if you'll indulge me, what you're talking about there, being a disruptable, so thinking about these differently, for me is a very personal thing, which comes from being queer and queering things. And so in my research, but also in my everyday, that's a very intentional thing. And I, what I mean by the word queer there as a verb is to take something that people have said it's always like that, boys will be boys, whatever it is, there are men and there are women. And to say But what if it wasn't? Actually, I think it's a bit more complicated than that. And that approach, generally, in everything that I design and I write, clearly comes from being a queer person myself, because I know that things aren't that way, and that identity that I bring as a human, as well as a designer and a researcher, is super important to me. Will: Yeah, and that's similar with me, actually, because as someone that came out as non binary at the start of last year I've been having the same, similar sort of journey in that I'm rethinking who I am as a person, how I present to the world, and it's a quite, difficult thing to do. It's not as, I can be very confident with, let's disrupt the animation space, but it's not quite as easy to go out in public in a, skirt or a dress or something, because there's very real, dangers that you can face, but I'm actually in the process of redesigning Loan With Will from the ground up, redesigning the characters and things like that, and Will in the new version of Loan With will very much have a much more expansive look and expansive wardrobe and, one episode might be in dungarees and the other might be in, a skirt and a cute top or something. And so it's, learn with will hopefully continue that idea of challenging those sort of things and obviously opens up to backlash and things, but I'm going to, stand my ground and, Will is going to be as good a reflection of who I am in my everyday life. In the same way that we've, presenting maths and other subjects and teaching them in this in the way. What's the phrase? It's yeah, start as you mean to go on and yeah. Lucy: And I'll note as well that I remember having some conversations with you about how I would present in the video and you very kindly did me wearing I believe it was a suit and tie and a very nice hat. Will: Yes, so you were very much the Indiana Jones character in that, and I was the Indiana Jones dad in that, so we both had a hat, we both had hats, but you had the sort of, the wide brimmed one, and I had the sort of, much more narrow brimmed one, and maybe, if we did that again today, it'd be that I'd be the sort of, plucky female assistant or Something I wanted to also talk about was so we did that video together and then so far that's the only one that you've appeared as a guest in, but you've had a very instructive role in one of my other videos, which you've said before is one of your favourite things that I've done, which is the video about prime numbers. Lucy: It's one of my favourite things full stop. Will: Yeah thank you very much. It'd be great to actually get your perspective on, why do you think that's such a successful video? Lucy: This is what I mean about not doing yourself a disservice, because, I pride myself on trying to spend a lot of my time thinking up different ways to see mathematics, whether that's metaphors or tools or visualizations or diagrams or images or whatever it is. When I first saw that script, I was again in the position of thinking it's very easy to mess this up. It's very easy to talk about prime numbers in a way that feels very procedural or functional, doesn't really get underneath, again, where's my motivation. And your initial scenario, absolutely floored me in how insightful and great it was. I absolutely went away thinking, why didn't I think of that? And for those who haven't seen, please do watch it, but there's a really lovely scenario that Will finds themselves in, which is a kind of being a brilliant employee and wanting to put up their certificates of employee of the month and wanting to put them up in a way that's visually pleasing. And you can see where this is going, I hope, wanting to have an array, what we'd call an array. So a nice rectangular way of doing it, some numbers of certificates lend themselves more nicely to an array than others. That's all I should say, right? Will: Yeah, and the great thing about that, and this is one of the things I absolutely love about Learn With Will, is the totally non aside from the learning stuff, is that I get to just fill videos with gags and fun bits that are on the screen for seconds, but I know are there and I love doing. Lucy: Yeah, I just loved the scenario. I thought it was incredibly well designed to motivate this What seems like a very simple concept when you illustrate it like that and there you go, right? You've done your job. Perfect Will: Similarly, I've got I think I'll keep them to myself my sort of examples that I'm going to be doing in the future for things like probability and although I will say that my next project which is the one that's taking by far the longest time of learn with all videos ever taken because it inspired me to actually redesign the whole thing visually from the ground up. It's going to be a video for science about speed and instead of a train leaves at this platform at this time and then gets how, how quick was it traveling, I'm going to be doing my own version of Wacky Races. Which, you've got Marvin the Milkman, who is obviously the slowest of the pack because he's in that little electric milk float, he's just chugging along. And then you've got my take on Dick Dastardly, which is Wicked Will. So I get to be the sort of evil villain for the first time, which will be fun. Lucy: I'm really looking forward to that one, and I suspect the listeners will be too. Will: Me too! It's taken so long just to do one of the characters. Lucy: Is there anything that you want listeners to take away from this Lovely little fireside chat with you and I? Will: I think it's just as someone that considers themselves an animator first and a Psycom person second, I've fell into the world of sci-comm just by coincidence, but it's it's one of those things that, I've done animation stuff for, adverts for things and, title sequences and all that sort of stuff. And Learn with Will is by far my least profitable thing ever because I've not earned any money back from it, unfortunately, but no, hopefully not yet, but just to have I've had a few comments and things from total strangers saying, Oh, this, this is such a, I get this or something like that. And I just think that it's Such a lovely use of animation. I think animation is just total magic to me. It's something that I grew up with. It's something that I've been fascinated by since I was a little kid. And, but I also grew up With things like the Dorling Kindersley CD ROM games, TV shows like Art Attack and Smart and Fingertips and Words and Pictures with Sophie Aldred and all these, educational type shows. And feel like Learn With Will feels like Even though it took me until 2021 to actually start it, it feels like the most me projects that I've ever made. So it just feels right as that's where I put my animation skills and techniques to best use. And yeah, hopefully one day I can find a way to make a little bit of money back from it. But even if I don't, it's still been so much fun to do and hopefully we'll. Just be even more enjoyable in the future. Lucy: That's a wonderful way to end. And I would absolutely encourage listeners to, to go and check it out and let us know, let Will know your feedback. And as I said, I am here because I responded to Will asking if anybody wanted to come and chat about. An animation about maths, and that could be you, I would imagine. If you want to be part of Will's core stuff, I imagine you can just get in touch with Will. How can I get in touch with you? Will? Will: They can, they can find out about Loan with Will by going to loan with will.co uk, which would direct you straight to the YouTube channel. My own animation work is on wd.co uk and similarly, you can email me. And Lucy, how can they find out about your work? Lucy: Thank you. If people are interested, I have a website so you can just search for Lucy Rycroft-Smith and my website should come up. And my email's on there, my institutional email. If you have an interesting project that involves my laundry list, so art, maths, creative methods, using research to make decisions, teaching, design, equity and design. Will: Queering things. Lucy: Whatever you like, absolutely, anything queer I'm in automatically. You can send me an email and I would absolutely love to get in touch with you and hear all about your cool ideas. Thank you so much. --- Katie: That's all for this episode of the Talking Maths in Public podcast, and for this series. Head to talkingmathsinpublic.uk/podcast to listen to all of the first series and to find out more about the TMiP network, including our next conference in 2025, which will be taking place at the University of Warwick. We'll be back in 2026 with series two of the podcast, and if you'd like to get involved or be featured, or to just keep listening and find out about the world of maths communication, we'd love for you to join us. See you then!