Our Story and Approach
Jamie York’s Making Math Meaningful™ curriculum grew out of his own teaching notes and worksheets. That series of books led to teacher training workshops around the world, and the Academy was born of a request to help bring the same curriculum to homeschool families.
Our approach has been to serve the needs of our growing community with the finest teachers and tutors, to enliven curiosity and interest in the world, and help students succeed by developing a love of learning and working together on problems and puzzles.
Our Story
From hand-written worksheets to the Making Math Meaningful™ curriculum
Jamie York began teaching following a stint in the Peace Corps in Nepal 30 years ago. He trained in the Waldorf Teacher Training in Wilton, NH and began teaching high school and middle school math in a Waldorf School in Colorado. For his classes, Jamie made worksheets and wrote down his own teaching notes, refining these over time as he observed his classes and students. When other teachers would ask, he generously copied those notes and worksheets and shared them.
Eventually, the packet of materials grew rather large, as did the photocopying work as more and more teachers sought his notes and worksheets. The photocopying turned into printing when he partnered with a publisher to create a series of math resource books for teachers. The Making Math Meaningful™ book series was born, and expanded to include grade levels from elementary through middle to high school, as well as books of math puzzles and games, workbooks for many grades, and other resources.
Their no-nonsense, content-rich structure became a hallmark; teachers and schools around the world sought refuge in the well-organized, time-tested resources his books provided. The success and widespread adoption of the Making Math Meaningful™ resources led to requests for Jamie to lead teacher training workshops, even as he continued his work in the classroom. He traveled extensively, giving workshops and consulting with schools. The books were also adopted by a growing community of homeschool families.
The Birth of the Online Academy
Juggling a teaching schedule and the growing number of consulting requests from around the world meant that Jamie decided to leave in-person teaching and travel to lead more workshops. After an exhausting year of global travel and workshops, in 2019 Jamie came home to a new request, from the homeschool families. Would he be willing to bring that rich experience of the classroom math teaching to them? Technology had matured and become ubiquitous in the home, and this meant that homeschool students could connect in an online setting no matter where in the world they were located.
The Jamie York Academy was born of that desire in the homeschool community, and began to grow. At first, there was just math, and Jamie recorded lectures for multiple grades, while also developing a group-work curriculum for cohorts of students to work together. There was one former student as a tutor.
Growth of the Online Academy and Evolution to in-person oppportunities
As the Academy grew, more teachers and tutors were brought on board, and requests for science courses came in. From the beginning, courses were only added if the right teacher who could deliver the highest quality course would commit, and if there was a need. The idea was to simply to offer courses that would best serve the needs of home (and in-person) schools. Connections to some of the best teachers meant that humanities courses could also be added, when the right teacher and right demand arose.
As the Academy was maturing, suddenly the world at large wrestled with online teaching (during COVID) and the Jamie York Academy was situated perfectly to offer help. The peer-group work sessions meant that students across the country and the globe were connecting in meaningful projects solving problems and puzzles together. To Jamie’s surprise and delight, meaningful and lasting friendships and relationships were forming among students located across time zones and vast distances. An online community was taking root and growing in the Jamie York Academy. This growing connection among the students led to the in-person opportunities now being created.
From the beginning, the Academy was never under pressure to become a ‘complete school’ offering everything to everyone. It has grown in directions that support the growing community, based on connections to teachers in whom we have complete confidence in their superior teaching. 30 years of networking in the Waldorf community at-large, and the nature of our online model, means that we can work with the best teachers located anywhere in the world.
Our Approach
Math is not a collection of blind procedures to solve meaningless problems. It is often the least understood and least penetrated aspect of the Waldorf curriculum, and an often-problematic area in all schools.
Jamie York believes that the onus is on the teacher to teach math in the belief that it is interesting, in and of itself. The Making Math Meaningful™ curriculum focuses on what is essential to develop mathematical capacity. This is true for all the subjects being taught.
There are no contrived ways of making math ‘fun’ in the courses. Our philosophy is that a love of learning comes through the teacher, and so we’re committed to supporting teachers to develop their teaching skills and to create a love of math in their students.
Teachers are often tormented by the “list” of materials they are told they need to get through in the teaching of math. A standard mainstream textbook for 7th grade is more than 1000 pages long. That’s insane!
Jamie has boiled that list down in order to focus on essentials. And his students are still able to tackle the math they encounter beyond their grade school careers. Jamie York believes in depth over superficiality. His own students develop a life-long love of math and approach the subject with a depth that others around them often lack.
Developmentally-Appropriate Learning
Meeting the Needs of your Child
Waldorf education is developmentally based. In part, this means that, regardless of intelligence or ability, topics are chosen primarily based upon the age of the students. If a child is behind grade level and has weak skills (and honestly, most children have some holes in their math skills base), then that child will still experience the proper grade-level topics. Also, we don’t feel it is desirable for a gifted student to be doing math that is meant be for older students; we don’t engage in the “race to get ahead”. However, it is absolutely our intention to make sure that all students are met; we will do our best to offer challenging material for the more advanced students, and somehow, at the same time, make sure that nobody is feeling overwhelmed and anxious. This is challenging for us teachers! Hopefully, we will all get to the end of the year with all of our students feeling successful, appropriately challenged, and excited about learning math.
In some rare cases, an advanced math student may choose to join the Math Academy three weeks after the start of the year, which is a time that many grades (specifically, grades 5, 6, 7, and 9) focus on reviewing previous material.
My Child is “Behind” – What should I do?
Today’s parents seem to worry about their child being “behind”. Most students have some holes or weaknesses with their math skills. But don’t worry, I start with the assumption that all students have either not been introduced to certain topics, or have forgotten. My job is to introduce new material in an engaging way that works for children of all ability levels, and to find ways to review and strengthen skills that were introduced (or not) in previous years.
However, if your child is truly too far behind grade level or his/her learning challenges are too great, then you may choose to have your child just work individually with one of our tutors instead of being enrolled in a class with other students.
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