In this presentation, Nathalie will introduce a new multi-touch app called TouchTimes, which aims to put multiplication in motion, primarily through gesture-based interactions. Instead of demanding that children memorise multiplication facts, or resorting to a sequential logic of repeated addition, TouchTimes mobilises simultaneity, hapticity and relationality. Using Whitehead’s concept of prehension, Nathalie will show how this two-handed, mobile arithmetic is experienced by young learners, highlighting the pre-conscious, aesthetic nature of the way they take up multiplication in motion.

Nathalie Sinclair is the Canada Research Chair in Tangible Mathematics Learning and professor of mathematics education at Simon Fraser University. She is interested both in the aesthetic dimension of mathematical activity and in the role of digital technologies in mathematical thinking and learning. Her books include Mathematics and the Body: Material Entanglements in the Classroom (with Elizabeth de Freitas) and Mathematics and Beauty: Aesthetics approaches to teaching children. Prior digital technology development includes TouchCounts, which is freely available on the App Store.