Freeport’s Katia Booker wins national KIPP teaching honor for math creativity

When it comes to numbers, middle school teacher Katia Booker knows the score.

Booker, a Freeport resident who teaches at KIPP Amp Middle School in Brooklyn, has built a reputation for using whatever her students like and can relate to in order to spark their interest in mathematics. That creativity recently earned her a Harriett Ball Excellence in Teaching Award and a proclamation of honor from the Village of Freeport.

“I want the kids to be able to relate to math and retain it,” says Booker, who acknowledges being a math nerd growing up. “I knew the kids were really into wrestling and WWE and other (wrestling federations), so I created math problems that incorporated wrestling-related problems.”

In one exercise, students were asked to calculate the fastest and most cost-effective way to pursue a career as a WWE wrestler. In another, she connected algebra lessons to dancing and theater.