Damath

Damath

by: Allyson T.

HISTORY

Jesus L. Huenda

THANK YOU FOR LISTENING!

Damath was invented by Jesus L. Huenda, a teacher in Sorsogon, Philippines who had encountered problems in teaching math using traditional teaching methods.

Inspired in part by an investigatory project called “Dama de Numero” submitted by a student in 1975, Huenda overhauled the game and introduced it to his class, who enjoyed playing. Damath became popular and in 1980, the first Damath tournament was held in Sorsogon.

The game founder

Jesus L. Huenda

SCORE SHEET

"When school children play damath boardgame they also learn to explore, firm-up, deepen, and transfer to daily tasks the concepts of real numbers and its properties and operations."

“Unknowingly, the players are using the mathematical fundamentals when they play damath”, Mr. Huenda explained. “Those who used to dislike math is actually learning how to use math when he/she plays the boardgame and in the process learn the subject,” he added.

https://sorsogonunited.wordpress.com/2010/03/03/damath-learning-math-the-pinoy-way/

ACHIEVEMENTS

AND MORE..!

dama + math

= damath!

Variations

Damath has different variations:

Huenda always thinks of ways to optimize his talents to help others. This describes best this ordinary teacher who was cited by no less than the late President of the Philippines Ferdinand Marcos for his out-of-the-box “contribution in terms of innovative approaches in teaching and learning mathematics” and Huenda received a gold medallion the year after.

• It is used as a teaching tool for both elementary and high school mathematics.
• Every piece has a corresponding number and each even (white) square on board has a mathematical symbol.
• Players have to do mathematical computations whenever they capture an opponent's chip.

• Counting Damath
• Whole Damath
• Fraction Damath
• Integer Damath
• Rational Damath
• Radical Damath
• Polynomial Damath
• Binary Damath
• Trigonometric Damath (introduced by Lucienne Marie B. Andres)

• Damath is a two-player educational board game combining the board game "Dama" (Filipino word for Checkers) and Mathematics that comes from the Philippines.
• It blends local culture, education and digital technology that aim to make math teaching and learning child-friendly, challenging and interactive.

The Board and Pieces

The game reached its peak popularity in the 1990s, when it made the rounds of several mathematics education conventions all over the world such as the 10th Conference of the Mathematical Association of Western Australia (MAWA), the UNESCO-ICT4E conference in Thailand, the SEAMEO RECSAM/SEAMEC conference in Malaysia, and the APEC Learning Community Builders (ALCoB) conference in Korea. Damath was first introduced to the United States of America by an international Filipino educator, Reynaldo L. Duran at the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) Conference in New Mexico, USA in 2011.

Huenda remains a very active staff at the DepEd (Department of Education) Central Office. Although he is a superintendent-eligible, Huenda opted to focus on educational technology innovations that will make a difference in basic education.

The Damath board, similar to a chess board, consists of 8 x 8 squares alternating in black and white but with a twist. All even (white) squares on the board have the four basic mathematical symbol operations--addition, subtraction, multiplication and division which dictates the operation that will be used when a player's piece captures the opponent's piece. It has numbers labeled 0-7 on its sides to determine the coordinates of the piece. Each piece of the player has corresponding values depending on what type of damath is being played. Both board and damath pieces are mostly made of thick cardboard.

MECHANICS

Standard Damath Board

5. A chip is declared 'dama' if it stops in any of the following squares of the opposing player:(1,0) (3,0) (5,0) (7,0)

6. Similarly, the opposing player's chip is declared 'dama' if it stops in any of the following squares:(0,7) (2,7) (4,7) (6,7)

8. Correspondingly, if a 'dama' chip takes an opponent's 'dama'chip, then its score is doubled.

9. The game ends if:

the 20-minute game period lapsed

the moves are repetitive

a player has no more chip to move

an opponent's chip is 'cornered'

1. The two players will toss a coin to see who will make the first 'move'.

2. The two players alternately take turns in moving a chip. (pass is not allowed)

3. Each player is allotted one minute per 'move' including the computing of the 'move' and the corresponding score in the score sheet.

4. In taking an opponent's chip, the 'taker' chip jumps over the 'taken' chip and uses any of the four operation symbols of addition,subtraction, multiplication, and division where the chip lands.

7. A 'dama' chip can slide diagonally forward or backward in any unoccupied square as long as no opponent's chip blocks its path. It could take a chip or chips whereby its corresponding sum, difference, product or quotient is doubled. Similarly, if an ordinary chip takes an opponent's 'dama' chip, its score is also doubled.

10. The remaining chip or chips of the players are to be added to their respective scores. If the remaining chip is a 'dama', then its score is also doubled.

11. The Player with the greater accumulated total score wins the game.