Have you ever wondered about the maths that hides behind your favourite games? Here is a reveal about the amazing mathematical baselines that makes two of our games, Pollinate 8 and Octoputs, so interesting & fun.
Pollinate 8: Buzzy Bees’ Pollination Matching Game
Pollinate 8 offers fast-paced fun for 2-8 players, regardless of their age. Each 15-minute round or more is a delightful recognition of nature’s pollination process. While you play, you’ll sharpen your quick thinking, visual perception, and attention to detail. Dive into the enchanting world of pollination, celebrate the beauty of flowers, fruit and other yummy products of pollination, and develop an appreciation for our world’s little heroes: pollinators.
Pollinators, such as bees, butterflies, and birds, are instrumental in the reproduction of flowering plants, including many of the fruits and vegetables we rely on for sustenance. Pollinate 8 introduces players to examples of the actors in these magical interdependent relationships, and offers an opportunity for discussion that highlights the importance of conserving these essential creatures and their habitats.
By using the cards as a prompt to discuss the delicate balance between pollinators and plants, players can foster a sense of responsibility towards protecting these invaluable creatures. Exploring the threats facing pollinators, such as habitat loss and pesticide use, can help encourage players to explore ways they can contribute to pollinator conservation. Learn more about this issue & what you or your school can do to help.
Pollinate 8 game comes with 57 unique matching cards, a rule book, all neatly packed in a pocket sized, eco-friendly tin. What’s magical? Even though there are 57 of them, every single card in the deck has just one matching item to every other card!
Octoputs: A Splash of Ocean Awareness
Octoputs is a fast-paced, pocket-sized game designed for kids from 4 to 104 years of age! Compact, colourful, and suitable for 2-8 players, Octoputs offers your family or study group truly uproarious fun!. The premise is simple: find matching images on two cards and get ready for waves of laughter and excitement.
Identifying the meaning of the clues in Octoputs helps introduce magical ocean creatures and the importance of preserving our oceans. As you explore the game, you’ll discover fascinating marine life and gain insights into basic environmental protection.
Octoputs introduces players to the wonders of ocean life as well as the urgent need to address ocean pollution and plastic waste. As players match marine-themed cards they familiarise themselves with topics that can prompt meaningful conversations about the environmental challenges our oceans face. All ecogames Ocean Themed games are designed to inspire players to take action, such as reducing single-use plastics and supporting marine conservation efforts. Learn more about this issue & what you or your school can do to help.
The enchanting maths behind the game
When you pick any card from the deck of either Pollinate 8 or Octoputs, there’s another card that completes a pair with it, and no other card does. This kind of arrangement is a perfect example of a mathematical concept known as a “combinatorial design.”
So how is it possible that every card in Pollinate 8 and Octoputs has just one matching item to every other card?
The concept that underpins this arrangement is a bit complex, it’s deeply rooted in “combinatorics”, a branch of mathematics that deals with combinations and arrangements of objects under specific constraints. To put it simply, it’s a systematic way to pair up all the cards in the deck.
This intriguing problem was initially posed by the Reverend Thomas Penyngton Kirkman in 1850 in a puzzle he submitted to “The Ladies and Gentleman’s Diary.” The question he asked was: “Fifteen young ladies in a school walk out three abreast for seven days in succession: it is required to arrange them daily, so that no two shall walk twice abreast.” Kirkman’s Schoolgirl Problem, as it came to be known, is essentially a combinatorial design problem. The goal is to find a systematic arrangement of the schoolgirls so that they walk together, but no pair walks together more than once.
Fast forward to the 1960s, when the mathematicians Dijen Ray-Chaudhuri and Richard Wilson collaborated on a theorem that demonstrated how to construct designs that meet this requirement. They provided a mathematical foundation that showed it was indeed possible to systematically arrange pairs of objects so that each object is paired with exactly one other object, and no repetition occurs. Ray-Chaudhuri and Wilson’s groundbreaking solution to Kirkman’s Schoolgirl Problem in 1968 sparked significant interest in the mathematical community, particularly in the context of its applications in the emerging fields of coding and computation.
In 1976, Jacques Cottereau, a young maths enthusiast from France, drew inspiration from the novel concepts of error-correcting codes and the principles of “incomplete balanced blocks,” which involved arranging a finite set of elements into subsets satisfying specific “balance” criteria—an approach commonly used in experimental design. He reimagined the Schoolgirl Problem in the form of a “game of insects”, a set of 31 cards, each with six distinct images of insects that could be uniquely matched. His ingenious adaptation opened up exciting possibilities for both mathematical exploration and engaging gameplay.
At Ecogames.net, we believe that learning can be both entertaining and enlightening. Games like Pollinate 8 and Octoputs offer not only hours of fun but also an opportunity to appreciate our environments and the magic of mathematics. Our games aim to be tools for fostering environmental awareness and inspiring positive change in the world.
Math Magic: ecogames’ Card Games: Pollinate 8 and Octoputs
Have you ever wondered about the maths that hides behind your favourite games? Here is a reveal about the amazing mathematical baselines that makes two of our games, Pollinate 8 and Octoputs, so interesting & fun.
Pollinate 8: Buzzy Bees’ Pollination Matching Game
Pollinate 8 offers fast-paced fun for 2-8 players, regardless of their age. Each 15-minute round or more is a delightful recognition of nature’s pollination process. While you play, you’ll sharpen your quick thinking, visual perception, and attention to detail. Dive into the enchanting world of pollination, celebrate the beauty of flowers, fruit and other yummy products of pollination, and develop an appreciation for our world’s little heroes: pollinators.
Pollinators, such as bees, butterflies, and birds, are instrumental in the reproduction of flowering plants, including many of the fruits and vegetables we rely on for sustenance. Pollinate 8 introduces players to examples of the actors in these magical interdependent relationships, and offers an opportunity for discussion that highlights the importance of conserving these essential creatures and their habitats.
By using the cards as a prompt to discuss the delicate balance between pollinators and plants, players can foster a sense of responsibility towards protecting these invaluable creatures. Exploring the threats facing pollinators, such as habitat loss and pesticide use, can help encourage players to explore ways they can contribute to pollinator conservation. Learn more about this issue & what you or your school can do to help.
Pollinate 8 game comes with 57 unique matching cards, a rule book, all neatly packed in a pocket sized, eco-friendly tin. What’s magical? Even though there are 57 of them, every single card in the deck has just one matching item to every other card!
Octoputs: A Splash of Ocean Awareness
Octoputs is a fast-paced, pocket-sized game designed for kids from 4 to 104 years of age! Compact, colourful, and suitable for 2-8 players, Octoputs offers your family or study group truly uproarious fun!. The premise is simple: find matching images on two cards and get ready for waves of laughter and excitement.
Identifying the meaning of the clues in Octoputs helps introduce magical ocean creatures and the importance of preserving our oceans. As you explore the game, you’ll discover fascinating marine life and gain insights into basic environmental protection.
Octoputs introduces players to the wonders of ocean life as well as the urgent need to address ocean pollution and plastic waste. As players match marine-themed cards they familiarise themselves with topics that can prompt meaningful conversations about the environmental challenges our oceans face. All ecogames Ocean Themed games are designed to inspire players to take action, such as reducing single-use plastics and supporting marine conservation efforts. Learn more about this issue & what you or your school can do to help.
The enchanting maths behind the game
When you pick any card from the deck of either Pollinate 8 or Octoputs, there’s another card that completes a pair with it, and no other card does. This kind of arrangement is a perfect example of a mathematical concept known as a “combinatorial design.”
So how is it possible that every card in Pollinate 8 and Octoputs has just one matching item to every other card?
The concept that underpins this arrangement is a bit complex, it’s deeply rooted in “combinatorics”, a branch of mathematics that deals with combinations and arrangements of objects under specific constraints. To put it simply, it’s a systematic way to pair up all the cards in the deck.
This intriguing problem was initially posed by the Reverend Thomas Penyngton Kirkman in 1850 in a puzzle he submitted to “The Ladies and Gentleman’s Diary.” The question he asked was: “Fifteen young ladies in a school walk out three abreast for seven days in succession: it is required to arrange them daily, so that no two shall walk twice abreast.” Kirkman’s Schoolgirl Problem, as it came to be known, is essentially a combinatorial design problem. The goal is to find a systematic arrangement of the schoolgirls so that they walk together, but no pair walks together more than once.
Fast forward to the 1960s, when the mathematicians Dijen Ray-Chaudhuri and Richard Wilson collaborated on a theorem that demonstrated how to construct designs that meet this requirement. They provided a mathematical foundation that showed it was indeed possible to systematically arrange pairs of objects so that each object is paired with exactly one other object, and no repetition occurs. Ray-Chaudhuri and Wilson’s groundbreaking solution to Kirkman’s Schoolgirl Problem in 1968 sparked significant interest in the mathematical community, particularly in the context of its applications in the emerging fields of coding and computation.
In 1976, Jacques Cottereau, a young maths enthusiast from France, drew inspiration from the novel concepts of error-correcting codes and the principles of “incomplete balanced blocks,” which involved arranging a finite set of elements into subsets satisfying specific “balance” criteria—an approach commonly used in experimental design. He reimagined the Schoolgirl Problem in the form of a “game of insects”, a set of 31 cards, each with six distinct images of insects that could be uniquely matched. His ingenious adaptation opened up exciting possibilities for both mathematical exploration and engaging gameplay.
At Ecogames.net, we believe that learning can be both entertaining and enlightening. Games like Pollinate 8 and Octoputs offer not only hours of fun but also an opportunity to appreciate our environments and the magic of mathematics. Our games aim to be tools for fostering environmental awareness and inspiring positive change in the world.
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