Cyclic

A math team that runs itself.

A free after-school math team for middle schools that don't have one — and the software that lets a volunteer with no competition background run it. Aimed at AMC 8 and MATHCOUNTS.

  • 12 problems a week
  • Spread over 4 days
  • 50-minute session

How it works

  1. A teacher hosts, a volunteer coaches.

    The school provides a room and a staff sponsor. The coach can be a parent, a high schooler, or a teacher from any subject — the program assumes no competition-math background.

  2. Students practice on their own during the week.

    Twelve problems, spread over four days. They're staged: a hint, a second hint, then the full solution — so being stuck is a step in the work rather than the end of it.

  3. The app turns that into the next session.

    Which problems the group actually missed, and what they flagged as confusing, become a one-page plan for the 50 minutes you have together. The goal is a coach prepping a full session in under ten minutes.

What a week looks like

Mon – Thu, on your own

Mon

3

problems

Tue

3

problems

Wed

3

problems

Thu

3

problems

Any day counts toward the goal — 8 of 12 by the end of the week. There's no streak to break; a student who misses Tuesday hasn't failed at anything.

Then, together — 50 minutes

  • Warm-up · 5 min
  • The week's misses · 15 min
  • New idea · 15 min
  • Competition round · 12 min
  • Close · 3 min

All year

Now

Weekly practice

AMC 8

January

MATHCOUNTS

February

A student who joins in November starts at the week the group is on, not at week one.

What we hold ourselves to

Free

No fee to the school, the family, or the student. There is nothing to upgrade to.

No personal information

A display name, a password, and answers to math problems. No email, no legal name, no birthday — there is nowhere in the system to put them.

No leaderboards

A student sees their own work and nobody else's. Ranking twelve-year-olds against each other is how you lose the ones who'd have been good at this.

Paper works too

Every problem set prints. A student without a device at home is a full participant, not a special case.

Bring Cyclic to your school

If you teach at a middle school without a math team, or you'd coach one, get in touch — starting a group takes a room, an hour a week, and a sponsor.

tigerh0414@gmail.com