Jim Tallmadge, who taught math for 35 years at Sam Hughes Elementary School, is being honored with Voices for Education's first Innovative Math Award. He is seen here volunteering at the school Friday, coordinating "math cross country."

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It's Friday morning and Jim Tallmadge is busy growing math jocks.

Tallmadge is coordinating "math cross country," which is why in this particular Midtown classroom the kids are sweating it out, even without a sports field.

With the class divided into two teams, a member from each heads to the front of the room to see whose brain can calculate a math problem the fastest.

"What's 50 plus 50, subtract 50, add one, subtract two?" Tallmadge asks, switching up the cadence so some words come out in a drawl and others pop like the sound of someone a little too happy with bubble wrap.

Fingernails are gnawed, hands shoot up, eyes squint or roll while numbers tick around in gray matter. When the battle participants are finished, there are typically a celebratory bounce from the winner and the universal aw-rats shuffle back to the desk for the other.

Math is not the only subject in which Tallmadge gets the competitive juices flowing. During his 35-year career at Sam Hughes Elementary School, he also regularly ran "spelling football," a fairly elaborate setup in which a wrong answer equals a fumble, but each correct answer translates into a 10-yard gain until a team scores a touchdown.

The 61-year-old, who retired five years ago but has continued to teach chess and volunteer at the school, is being honored with the non-profit Voices for Education's first Innovative Math Award. His reward, aside from a $1,500 stipend, is to stage a free three-hour workshop to share with other teachers the competitive games he coined.

Katy Rutter, now 40 and a resident of the Bay Area, has vivid recollections of the sixth-grade class she had with Tallmadge.

"Of all the teachers I've ever had, he was the most magical and motivational," she said.

Never particularly great at computational speed, she remembers how it felt to have a cringe coming on when she had to vie for the answer. But she also remembers soaring when she got the question right.

"You're standing there quivering, and he's pulling numbers off the top of his head and if you knew what that string of numbers had meant, you flung your hand in the air and your team would cheer and that felt pretty good," she recalled. "And if you weren't right? Well, you knew that maybe you needed to work more at your math."

The games, backed up with rigor, never felt juvenile, she said. And more than that, she appreciated the vibe of the classroom, in which Tallmadge set up pillows for reading nooks, lined the windowsills with plants, and provided room dividers to segment space. Students were encouraged to spice up classroom presentations or book reports by dressing in character or role playing. "It probably looked like chaos, but, for a kid, it was a magical kingdom of learning."

Robin Hiller, Voices director, said the idea behind the award is to inspire teaching.

"We're just really afraid that under No Child Left Behind, where people are trying to teach to the test, that creative teachers won't get the appropriate support," she said.

In a bit of circular fate, Tallmadge said his ideas were inspired by his own sixth-grade teacher, a former Marine with a competitive streak who would set up flashcard rivalries or break out the stopwatch to see how many questions could be answered in 30 seconds.

"I was a kid who liked that kind of thing, and this guy really got me going," Tallmadge said.

When he started teaching in 1968, Tallmadge immediately incorporated contests into his classroom. And while the education pendulum has swung back and forth on the benefits of competition, he said he never heard any complaints. In fact, he said, parents would come to watch.

And that's just what happened Friday. Kristi Thomas, a parent and school counselor, was there to watch her 8-year-old son, Colter, in his first math cross- country event. "I've been hearing about this for years," she said. "It doesn't start until third grade, and it's a really big deal for the kids. They're all excited about getting to participate in it."

Students were learning more than just math. When they chanted the name of their favorite contender and pounded the top of their desks, Tallmadge explained that was not appropriate sportsmanship. He explained how to be proud losers and gracious winners. He encouraged camaraderie.

Thomas liked what she saw. The energy was strong, the kids were excited about math, and the competition was kept in a gentle tone.

"Competition is a part of life," she said. "I think this gives them confidence."