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This was written in
2007
so is now very dated
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Chapters |
July 1st dawned – a typical Manchester summer’s day – pouring with rain. When we arrived there were cars, lorries and vans disgorging all manner of strange items. Within a very short space of time all floors of the stand were transformed and soon the general public started to pour in. In addition to the hangings on the walls, we had all six afghan games and three mazes on the floor, some other smaller activities, and a group of volunteers teaching adults and children to knit. Mark Barnes had given us blue and white yarn. Some of this was put to use early in the day, for tying up balloons, but the real plan was to use the Manchester City colours to create a wall-
The volunteer knitters were wonderful. They were probably most people’s idea of ‘typical knitters’ but they were very brave ladies. At first they seemed a little taken aback by their students. They were confronted with girls with tongue studs, boys with tattoos and other teenagers who they might have steered away from in other circumstances. Teenagers like these aren’t uncommon to teachers in secondary schools but they were outside the usual acquaintance of these ladies. They quickly overcame their apprehension and threw themselves into their task. They were soon assisted by mothers who were glad of a place to sit down while their children investigated other activities. During the day many squares were knitted but there was to be no permanent record of the effort, other than a few photographs. Every knitter, without exception, asked to take their square home. Because Mark had been so generous with the supply we were able to send everyone away with needles and a small ball of yarn. A lot was learned that day and not only by the new knitters. The new knitters went away with a new skill. The volunteers left with the urge to go on and teach others – whether or not they looked like potential knitters.
There were some surreal moments. Not least was a meeting with an old friend who performs as a clown, under the name of Hattie Maths. She had travelled a long way to be there and there had been problems with the journey. She arrived as a rather shy, ordinary person and a few minutes later emerged as a loud and bubbly clown, behaving in a way she could never have done in real life. We had seen this transformation many times before but what makes this occasion memorable was that later in the day we set off together, in search of the toilets and I found myself walking through crowds of people while Hattie recounted the story of her troublesome train journey. It suddenly struck me as an absurd situation to be having such a mundane conversation with a clown.
The games and mazes we had on the floor were ‘occupied’ all day. It was delightful to see families playing together, small children tracing paths round the mazes and gangs of teenagers organising noughts and crosses tournaments and other such events. The high point of that day was the high point of MathsYear2000 as far as we were concerned.
We had been aware of a father playing Ludo with his two daughters but had not taken much notice of them. Family groups didn’t need our intervention. Parents who had brought their children to the event were taking every opportunity to make it a fun experience. This particular family must have played on that one game for the best part of an hour and, when there was a lull in the crowds around us, we decided to take some photographs. As we went towards them it was obvious that this was an unusual family group. The younger daughter was making very exaggerated movements and barely distinguishable sounds. However it was obvious that she was making great efforts to count the spots on the dice, with her father and sister giving her every encouragement. She had Down’s Syndrome, and some restriction in movement. The large scale of the board and dice meant that she was able to sit on the game, count the spots on the dice and count out the spaces round the game to match. We had always had doubts about the value of the games but this convinced us that Maths at such a basic level is at least as important as anything else we had ever done.
This was the first and last time we ever had space enough to have all these games laid out at once and they were a great success. There were a few minor problems. We were already used to teenagers using the playing pieces for Draughts, Chess and Noughts and Crosses as Frisbees but they are soft and harmless (The pieces, not the teenagers!) and the novelty of throwing them soon wears off; it was pouring with rain so people arrived with wet feet causing some anxiety for parents trying to stop their children walking on the games; we were near the burger and drink stands so there were inevitable spills. None of this mattered because all of the games went in the washing machine as soon as we got home; they came out looking like new. Fortunately, despite various criticisms, we have always used inexpensive acrylic yarns, which will withstand such treatment.
The Velcro on modern-
18e. AFGHANS & MATHGHANS continued