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High School Math Department: Demo Class – Board Game Probability

May 6, 2021

On the afternoon of April 29, Ms. Yuan Shuyi held a demo class in Xianmian Building. The topic was the probabilities in a board game designed by Ms. Yuan.

Ms. Yuan first reviewed the permutation problems through a board-game seating arrangement at a round table. Then, she introduced her original board game: "Welcome to Mia's Math Class". A player acting as a student has an initial tally of 2 HP. Homework, projects, quizzes, midterm exams, and final exams will cause the deduction of HP; class discussions, diligence, and etc., are the functional cards. A student who completes the entire semester maintaining HP greater than or equal to one is the winner.

After group discussions and several rounds of playing the game, students understood the rules. Then, Ms. Yuan asked the students to think about the probability of a winning strategy and guided the students first to simplify the questions and then discuss a more complicated situation. She encouraged the students to put forward their assumptions and to ask them of their probability questions. During the exploration, Ms. Yuan interspersed and verified some probability ideas. For example, the order is not essential in a lucky draw; the enumeration method can be effective when the number of outcomes is small as the computer simulation can help. Finally, after deducing the winning probabilities in several scenarios, Ms. Yuan stressed the importance of diligence in learning.

Students participated actively throughout the demo class. The demo class deepened their understanding of probability. Also, it strengthened the students' habit of critical thinking by asking "good" questions and made the students aware of the power of effective and practical hard work.

(Written by Xu Baiting Pictures by Xu Baiting)