Factoring is friendship (check this out by 6/30); graph theory activities; Triangle, NC gatherings – June 2026 news

Thank you for checking out what’s new in the Math Maker Neighborhood! In this newsletter, you’ll see:

1. Future Book Club news about three math fiction stories for elementary, middle school, and young adult readers.
2. Math Maker activities: two graph theory explorations with Juneteenth themes for your family or math circle, ages 5 to adult.
3. Research Triangle, NC live math: event series at Dix Park, Raleigh, a joint fundraiser with The Forge Initiative, and more.

Future Book Club news

Every Natural Math book is made together with hundreds of early readers, parents and teachers who test the materials with students, as well as backers joining the crowdfunding campaigns and spreading the word. Thank you, Future Book Club. You rock! Here is some news about our upcoming books.

My Hundred Friends by Kara Shane Colley is a highly illustrated book where numbers are people, and multiplication, division, and factors lead to friendships. (People ask this a lot, but don’t worry, the primes aren’t lonely in the story!) Children who like pretend-play, anyone who’s into cozy comics, and those who want solid pre-algebra foundations will love this fresh take on multiplicative reasoning. The book is being crowdfunded at Natural Math until the end of June. Check it out! See sample pages, meet the author, read geeky updates about writing mathematical fiction, and join the club.

Upper elementary and middle-school students who want a story that’s a step beyond multiplication will enjoy Modultown! That book about characters who live by modulo arithmetic will be going to its backers a couple of weeks from now. After that, it will be available to the general public. Check out a sample chapter and fanart from the early readers! The authors, Drs. Sasha Fradkin and Allison Bishop, and the artist, Mark Gonyea, really delivered on the bonus puzzle booklet. It came out beautiful and mathematically enticing. Here’s a little sample:

For the high school crowd, we have a young adult graphic novel coming out later this summer, AL, Logical by the son and father team of Xavi Golden and Dr. John Golden. If you like math puzzles, ghosts, and the strange, you will love this fantasy story. Xavi is wrapping up a new cover, to be revealed soon. Meanwhile, John is running the revised math notes by a few colleagues for a final round of feedback. Thank you to all who helped! Here’s a rabbit hole/bonus definitions game from the Notes. Beware, this game looks mild, but it can spark hours of math debates in your class or around the kitchen table.

The mathematician is pretty picky about language, and some would say that is not unusual for mathematicians. Is everything either dead or alive? Is the mathematician dead or alive? Is the mathematician a ghost? Are ghosts dead or alive? Mathematicians often try to resolve questions like these by coming up with a good definition. That allows us to be precise. But first we have to agree on the definition! We usually make lists of things we want to fit the category and of things that don’t fit the category. For Alive and Not Alive, where would you put: people, dogs, trees, wood, seeds, ghosts, bacteria, viruses, cells? This can get pretty difficult. What might seem counterintuitive is that we want it to be difficult! Try to break your definition with difficult examples.

Math Maker activities

Grab these ready-to-use printouts for your family mathematics, the “M” part of your STEM event, or a math circle. This June, we partnered with Triangle Math Teachers’ Circle and Dix Park to develop two graph theory activities. They are accessible for anyone who can count to 10 (ages 5 and up), and celebrate Juneteenth themes.

• Topology vs. Geometry – Gee’s Bend Quilts
• Map and Graph Coloring

Research Triangle, NC math maker events, Summer-Fall 2026

Join these local events! Math Maker Neighborhood is a gathering of people and organizations. We aim to make all the subject areas of mathematics accessible to everyone. Our benchmark: 5-year-old children making their own creations using mathematical tools from these subject areas and sharing that know-how with friends. These events put joyful experiences in a bigger mathematical context. Do you have a math circle, math event, or want to add math to your community event? Let’s add your gathering to this list!

Photo: Math Makers @ Dix Park, June 2026

• June 17, July 1, and August 12, 10 a.m. to noon—Math Makers @ Dix Park, Raleigh—all ages—family math mini-festival with puzzles, games, and art activities in an indoor space, with a take-home math kit—free, optional RSVP, volunteers welcome.
• August-December, every other Saturday morning—UNC Chapel Hill Math Circle—multiple age bands—explorations and problem-solving—free, registration is required.
• September 19, 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. —Bugfest, NC Museum of Natural Sciences, Raleigh—all ages—largest indoor and outdoor STEM festival in the region—free, come and play, volunteers welcome.
• Fall, to be announced—NC State Mini-Fest and Math Circle, Raleigh—multiple age bands—large-group interactive lecture and festival puzzles, games, and art activities at the math department—optional RSVP.
• Fall 2026, weekly—Durham Academy Math Circle—grades 3-4 students—explorations, art, and problem-solving—for students at DA (see the school catalog).

NEW: The Forge Initiative open tech space in Apex and Natural Math are collaborating to start math circles and events at The Forge. Until the end of June, we are running a joint fundraiser with the local math friends. Check it out!

If you’d like to volunteer, have a question, or want to talk about children learning mathematics, contact Natural Math.