Isfahan Mathematics House was established for advancing mathematical sciences.
It is a playground for non-conventional education, an information center for history of mathematics and a place to familiarize young students with various mathematical sciences through observations, collaboration and benefiting from different information resources.

Future Plans

  •  Continuation of previous programs

  • Creation of a game room

  • Launching mathematics laboratory

  • Launching studio for producing the CD for the blinds

  • Mathematics and the Blinds seminars

  • Mathematics and Art workshops

  • Scientific consultations

  • Producing electronic content

  • Doing researchers and consultations for industries

Plans about Information Technology:

  • Teaching Windows and other bases, Internet, Tex, Maple, SAS and other mathematical packages.

  • Establishment of an interanet as a base for establishment of school – net of Isfahan.

  • Teaching Logo and other educational softwares to elementary school students.

  • Establishment of a cafe-net.

  • Establishment of an Information Club.

  • Construction of Computer packages for Mathematical Sciences Education.

Proposed projects of Isfahan Mathematics House (IMH) for scientific communication of the sister cities

In order to create contexts for scientific cooperation development between the sister cities of Isfahan, the following recommendations are designed:
1. Information be provided by IMH for sister cities, should be distributed among them
2. Scientific boards will be invited to visit IMH and give lectures in the fields of mathematics, mathematics education and information.
3. Every year math contest is held between teams of students from each city, in IMH
4. Each year, the winners of IMH festivals visit cultural and scientific center of these cities.
5. Collections of textbooks and other publications in the areas of math, science and learning of Mathematics should be prepared for IMH and Subsequently IMH should be ready to provide the same textbooks for those cities. (IMH required these books in order to produce education standards and this opportunity will be extremely valuable.)
6. Young people (pupils and students) from those cities participate in IMH festivals by presenting articles.
7. Possible connection for the students, university students and mathematics teachers, with their colleagues in these cities will be provided via the Internet.
8. Joint Conference on Mathematics education will be organized by the help of math educators from these cities.
9. Joint meeting of specialists in mathematics education of the sister cities will be performed in order to create joint cooperation
10. Attempts will be made to create academic relationships between Isfahan universities and the sister cities’ universities and cooperation agreements will be signed between universities and research institutes with IMH
11. Databases will be shared by the sister cities and Isfahan and also links will be provided with scientific centers of those cities through IMH website.

Isfahan is twinned with:

  • Lebanon Baalbek, Lebanon[15]

  • Spain Barcelona, Spain[16]

  • Nepal Kathmandu, Nepal

  • Egypt Cairo, Egypt

  • Senegal Dakar, Senegal

  • Italy Florence, Italy

  • Germany Freiburg, Germany

  • Cuba Havana, Cuba

  • India Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh, India

  • Romania Iaşi, Romania

  • Turkey Istanbul, Turkey[17][18]

  • Malaysia Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia[19]

  • Kuwait Kuwait City, Kuwait

  • Pakistan Lahore, Pakistan

  • Russia Saint Petersburg, Russia[20]

  • Italy Venice, Italy

  • China Xi’an, Shaanxi, China

  • Armenia Yerevan, Armenia(1995)[21][22]

 

As recalled in the 16th Study of ICMI, the origin of Mathematics Houses in Iran results from the creation of a high commission for the observance of the 2000-World Mathematical Year, set up in 1997 (Taylor & Barbeau, 2009). This commission took as a goal, the creation of Mathematics Houses. The first one opened in Isfahan in 1999, with the help of the municipality of Isfahan. The Houses are meant to provide opportunities for executing diversity of activities serving the general public, students at all levels and their families, teachers, university students, researchers and even university professors. Mathematics House is a lively and creative research center with the following goals; popularizing mathematics, developing mathematical awareness among the society, using mathematical sciences in all aspects of life and work, encouraging team working, promoting team working among young students and teachers, encouraging joint and collaborative research, encouraging interdisciplinary research, emphasis on incident learning, teaching the skills for a better understanding of mathematical concepts, teaching the skills for solving problems by using mathematical concepts and methods, investigating the history of mathematics, investigating the applications of mathematics, statistics and computer Sciences, developing information technology and expanding mathematical sciences among young students (Challenging Mathematics, 2012). Professor Jan Hogendijk, professor of the history of mathematics at Utrecht University in an article wrote that, “A more modern secret in Isfahan is its House of Mathematics, which encourages mathematics awareness among high school teachers and university students work together with high school projects. The circumstances are sometimes difficult but this only seems to make the staff more enthusiastic and more inventive” (Hogendijk, 2008). Now, there are 45 Mathematics Houses throughout the country and two others in France and Belgium. In ICME-13 in Germany, an International Network of Mathematical Houses was established (Kaiser, 2016).

The first mathematics house established in Isfahan (Iran) through the cooperation of some Iranian school teachers and university faculties since 1999 (Barbeau et. al., 2009).
Currently, there are more than 30 mathematics houses across the country and also more mathematics houses have established in France, Belgium and etc. Recently an international network of Mathematics Houses has been organized at the 13th International Congress of Mathematics Education in Germany in 2016 to foster more international collaboration.

Mathematics House is an innovative learning center focused on mathematics and informatics education but in a non-curricular way. It is a place for experimental learning
through workshops and projects, and subsequent reflection in showcases and mathematics festivals. One prominent example is Isfahan Mathematics House, a center of excellence as a learning environment (Barbeau et. al., 2009, Challenging Mathematics UNESCO, 2012)

Mathematics Houses have six main goals:

1. popularizing mathematics;
2. investigating the history of mathematics;
3. investigating the applications of mathematics, statistics and computer sciences;
4. developing information technology;
5. expanding mathematical sciences among young students;
6. promoting team working among young students and teachers.

These goals are achieved through:

• procuring facilities for non-conventional education;
• introducing new instructional techniques;
• establishing scientific data banks;
• encouraging joint and collaborative research;
• modeling and applying mathematical sciences;
• welcoming relevant novel ideas.

A diversity of activities serving the general public, students of all levels and their families, teachers and even university professors, graduate students, researchers and artists, are organized by the mathematics houses. We list these in the following paragraph, relying on the presentation made in (Barbeau & Taylor, 2009, pp. 88-92) and on a text written by Ali Rejali for the ICMI Bulletin on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the Isfahan Mathematics House (IMH) (Rejali, 2009). This very active mathematics house is an especially insightful example.

Activities organized by IMH include:

1- Lectures (both on popular and special topics in mathematics and mathematics education). For instance, every year, there are 5 or 6 public expository lectures and many special talks for special groups of students, teachers and members of the house.
2- Mathematics and information technologies exhibitions. Special “days” and “weeks” are regularly organized around such exhibitions. More generally, the mathematics houses provide computer facilities where participants can use and develop software, access the Internet and benefit from electronic resources for learning mathematics.
3- Activities for high school students. These are quite diverse and include research groups which present the results of their investigations in annual festivals or in publications, mathematics team competitions for instance in the frame of the International Tournament of Towns, the Isfahan school net which establishes
electronic communication for schools and provide information technology for education and research, robotics workshops, camps and problem-solving workshops.
4- Activities for university students: statistics day, research groups involved in collaborative research through electronic communication with Iranian researchers
abroad, entepreneurship for giving students the opportunity of designing web pages and software , introductory workshops to the use of mathematics and statistics
software.
5- Activities for teachers: research groups in various educational fields, information technology workshops to train teachers in the use of modern educational devices and
familiarize them with information technology, workshops on goals, standards and concepts of mathematics education for elementary teachers, on new secondary
courses and information technology for secondary teachers. 

At IMH, moreover, a group of researchers is developing specific activities for teaching mathematics and computer sciences to blind students. Beyond that IMH and some other mathematics houses maintain specialized libraries providing access to resources of interest regarding mathematics education available in the country.
Mathematics houses cooperate between themselves, but they also collaborate with various Iranian institutions such as the Adib Astronomy Centre, the Iranian Mathematical Society, the Iranian Statistical Society, the Isfahan Mathematics Teachers’ Society, the Iranian Association for Mathematics Teachers’ Societies, the Scientific Society for Development of Modern Iran; the Isfahan Society of Moje Nour for the blinds, and the Science and Art Foundation. New forms of cooperation are emerging with some other foreign institutes such as Fontys and the Freudenthal Institute in the Netherlands, or in France the association Animath coordinating the diversity of existing non-formal educational activities in mathematics and the IREM network (Instituts de Recherche sur l’Enseignement des Mathématiques)
.