Mental Math magic, memorization, and an auction at Canyon School

Principal Goodreau makes her bid

submitted by Lorraine Robbins

Canyon School is holding a Math Fair on March 5th and 6th and to help get students excited about this upcoming event, two speakers shared their expertise in using mental math in their lives and in their jobs.

Mental Math Magician Trevor Kiitokii

Mr. Trevor Kiitokii amazed the students and staff members with his Mental Math magic. It was astounding. Mr. Kiitokii was an expert performer getting his audience really involved with his presentation.

Tongue twisting auctioneer Bob Westrop explains Betty's bitter batter

Next, Mr. Bob Westrop explained to the assembly how he learned to become an auctioneer and how he had to practice counting forward and backward quickly many, many times and how he had to memorize tongue twisters as well. Mr. Westrop had ALL of students counting forward and backward by five’s and taught the students a tongue twister about Betty and her bitter batter.

Auction time! Second prize - Mr. Dietze (left foreground)

The assembly concluded with an auction of three items: a lemon meringue pie, an assistant principal (Mr. Dietze) and a picture that a former student had drawn. Excitement mounted as the auction proceeded.

Mr. Johnson was the winning bidder of the pie and later in the day, after a great lesson on fractions, shared it with his class.

Emma Dietze makes her bid

Mrs. Goodreau, Canyon’s principal, held out over daughter Emma Dietze and bought Mr. Dietze. Thankfully, he will continue to be our assistant principal. Emma, a grade 8 student just didn’t have enough money.

Alex Cameron wins Jiwon's picture

Alex Cameron bought the picture drawn by her good friend Jiwon.

At the end of the auction, Mr. Westrop commented, “These children should be at every auction to create more excitement. They were great and this was fun!”

All students and staff loved the excitement created by our guests. Now students are raising money for the Math Olympics happening on Feb. 13 and planning Math projects for the Math Fair in early March.