Numberblocks success is very much a product of the effort that Elliot, its team of writers, composers and animators in Blue Zoo pour into each and every episode. “It was all inspired by something I read as a teenager,” Elliot goes on to explain. “It was a strange book called Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions, written in 1884 by a mathematician called Edward Abbott Abott. “It was the life story of a square who lived in a flat space. Abbott Abott had really thought it through - and it turns out it was a satirical take on contemporary Victorian Morays - but also the square gets visited by a sphere who tries to explain what three dimensions are like. “Abbott had really thought through what it was like to be a square. So when I was wondering about how to bring the letters of the alphabet to life, or the numbers we use, the first thing I had to do was really, really think it through.” By his own admission, Elliot was no ordinary teenager. His was a youth spent enthralled by mathematics that went on to
“It’s about visualising mathematics, using block maths to teach children about squares from a younger age." Joe Elliot, creator of Numberblocks inform a career path in not only teaching, but latterly, interactive game development - a path chosen for “having spent so much time coming up with my own interactive lessons for class.” In fact, wherever Elliot’s career path has taken him, the compulsion to aid and educate has never been far away. Today, Elliot’s role as the lead creative on Numberblocks and Alphablocks sees him as close to the educational sector as he has ever been. It’s thanks to the accessibility of the subject that Numberblocks presents, in fact, that Elliot and the team now find themselves working alongside the National Centre for Excellence in the
Teaching of Mathematics (NCTEM) who is currently working to overhaul the curriculum to introduce children to the concept of mastery maths. “It’s about visualising mathematics, using block maths to teach children about squares from a younger age,” explains Elliot, sensing that he would need to. “Teachers have expressed how much better equipped for reading and numbers children are, having watched Numberblocks. As a result, there is now talk about changing the curriculum to get kids started earlier in schools; that’s directly because of the show we make.” Elliot wears this like a badge of honour. But while learning forms the foundations of what both Numberblocks and Alphablocks are about, he insists that it’s not the show’s intention, or indeed tone, to force education upon the millions of kids that watch his shows. “We just want to open children’s minds to the fun of numbers and words, offer them the reassurance that, as they start out on this journey of discovery, the water is
26 | toy news | May 2019
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