The frosty weather outside didn’t keep Leesylvania Elementary School families from participating in a math night at the school.

The theme was “Frosty fun with math,” and the Leesylvania Elementary staff provided just that. Families played math games- with a winter twist, learned math strategies, and received resources to work on math skills at home.

“It's very important because all of the math skills that they learn here in elementary school, they're going to need for middle school, high school and beyond,” stated Jennifer Honey, a Title I math teacher.

Molly Brennan, math coach at the school, said, "We wanted to have families play the games together so that the parents are able to play the engaging activities with their students and learn what their students are understanding with math and how to work with them on developing those different math fact fluency skills. Also, that they see their students excited about math.”

Margaret MacGregor, principal, said events like math night further build trust and community between the school and parents.

“We communicate to our families that we are true partners with them in their child's education,” MacGregor shared. “And when they come and engage in, whether it's a parent teacher conference, a family engagement night, [etc.], it truly sends the most incredible message to their child that their education is very important to them and to the family. We also like the opportunity to show what we are doing at school, and then how they can help at home because it is truly a partnership.”

At the end of the night, each student could take math games home to continue the fun.

“We hope that the families will play these games at home in order to practice their math facts and to kind of bring the families together over math,” Honey shared.