This is the new blog style for IPMG!  Thanks for stopping by.   We’re getting everything formatted and soon this will be a place for you to come for lots of great math content and links to great math education, math games and math activities ideas.

Please give us a week or two to get everything squared away.

Thanks,

Joel.

Bob Dylan popularized this phrase many years ago in his anthemic song of the same name.  IPMG Publishing has been changing in recent years for several reasons.

First, the launch of IPMG’s Tic Tac Math Apps created a unique opportunity to be a first mover as the first iPad app introduced at the NCTM conference in 2010.  Couple this with iPad adoptions in schools and it’s pretty clear that the print business is in trouble from a usage standpoint but also from an educational value perspective.

Second, the cost of printing has gone through the roof!  As it is now, IPMG Publishing can no longer afford to offer the discounts necessary to distributors, inventory the products and ship them out while still earning a profit.  So things have to change…..

What does this all mean?  Starting in 2013, we will begin to make … Read More »

Today this venerable name in educational publishing filed for bankruptcy. While troubling and sad, it is not surprising to this observer. It’s not the cited reasons of a poor economy, a lack of state and local funding or recession driven resources. It’s about resistance to change.

The transition from print to digital, and the resultant consumerization of education, has completely changed the landscape of the educational business. I feel for the big publishers whom have built businesses on the concept of producing a textbook, selling it to a district and then doing that over and over again. It worked for a long time, it doesn’t anymore.

The iPad and the app economy have decimated this business model by making content readily available, readily updatable and low cost. In addition, scholl districts, teachers, parents and students seem … Read More »

Last week I attended a conference on Technology. During the conference, there was a phrase used that I thought was very interesting and had a unique parallel to what I am trying to accomplish with IPMG.

The phrase “the Consumerization of IT” was used to describe the evolution of centralized IT services in companies to individuals managing their own devices with intermittent need for instruction and services. After the conference, this phrase stuck with me and I found myself stunned by the parallel to apps in education.

The mind-boggling part of this is that the app economy is shifting the responsibility more to the user. Away from a centralized system of we teach, you listen, learn and take test to an environment of, learn where and when you want to, use a device that makes sense … Read More »

These are the two most popular questions that I hear from customers of iplaymathgames.com.

To answer the first question, it’s IPMG’s book called "Math in the Cards".  This is a 220 page book packed with card games for a wide age range from Kindergarten to High School.  The best way to describe the book itself and answer the second question is with the introduction from the book itself:

Motivation, enjoyment and mastery are the main reasons for playing card games and solving puzzles. For the most part, card games and puzzles do not explicitly teach skills. However, playing, solving and creating games and puzzles can be a useful tool for diagnosis and practice. Card games provide students with an opportunity to utilize and solidify skills they have acquired. The games also provide occasions to teach skills prior to playing so … Read More »

What a great night!  The first Family Math Night at Bluff Creek Elementary School in Chanhassen, MN was a great success.  Principal Joan MacDonald and her staff did a wonderful job of arranging a Family Math Night that gave kids and parents a unique opportunity to explore a new relationship with math.

The Bluff Creek Family Math Night was anchored by a custom math game and activitiy workbook sponsored by Community Bank of Chanhassen and developed and published by IPMG Publishing, an Eden Prairie, MN developer of math games and activities.  Each student went home with a book, a deck of cards and a pair of dice to play the games at another time.

In addition, the evening featured students from the Middle School mentoring younger kids, a station that related math in music and a hands-on area to explore the math … Read More »

When I find something that is interesting, I love to pass it along.  So it is with Crewton Ramone’s House of Math.

Mr. Ramone is obviously a man who is passionate about math and is putting some great content out the ere on the internet.  Anyone who can make algebra seem as straightforward as he does deserves a lot of credit.

Like the IPMG site, Crewton’s House of Math is a great way for kids to begin building a positive relationship with math.

Here is the press release from the first comleted Family Math Night sponsored by a Community Bank for the 4 schools that surround it.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Media Contact
Joel Gaslin
IPMG Publishing, LLC
877-702-6284
mediarelations@iplaymathgames.com

Community Bank Chanhassen Sponsors Family Math Night Publication to Support Local Students, Families, Teachers and Schools.

New community outreach program encourages family interaction to further develop math skills

Chanhassen, MN December 13, 2010- Community Bank Chanhassen announced today the release of a new custom designed Family Math Night publication produced by IPMG Publishing, www.iplaymathgames.com.  The Family Math Night publication contains 16 math games and activities for kids in grades k-8 … Read More »

Interestingly, on www.iplaymathgames.com, the number one keyword is still, "Printable math games."  And it’s not just by a little bit, it’s significant. 

What that tells me is that there is still a large appetite for printed math games and activities in spite of all of the media coverage of digital and interactive formats.  That is not to say that the demand for those products does not exist, it most certainly does.  What it does show is the opportunity that still exists for printable math games as a necessary content component of an educational brand.  And we know that the majority of the trafic at iplaymathgames.com is teacher based.  They like IPMG’s assortment of Free printable math games.

So what does that mean if you lump all of this together?  To me, again, an opportunity!  IPMG has approximately 1000 active pdf’s of … Read More »

More on the Math Mind….

Today in the Minneapolis Startribune, there was a great story about teaching algebra. Read it here.

So much is written lately about math scores and what to do about their decline.  Like most sensitive issues, there is finger pointing and blame, but little offered in the way of solutions.  Maybe that’s because, unlike most math problems, there is no one solution.

People want simple answers to a complex problem that is as much social as it is educational.  For decades, math professionals have argued about the different methods of teaching mathematics.  And presented myriad studies and reports about which one is best.  Not one study or report can say "my method works 100% of the time."

What’s happening is we are forcing our teachers to "teach to the test."  But the test keeps changing and so do the kids … Read More »