Maths busking is the latest trend to hit the street – and its founders intend to convert you to the joys of maths.

Roll up, roll up. Be astounded at binary numbers, marvel at the wonders of mathematical topology. Pale at the possibilities of probability. Sounds unlikely? Not according to Sara Santos and Matt Parker, the brains behind the new phenomenon of maths busking.

Convinced that finding maths interesting and exciting did not make them weird, Santos, a maths communicator at the Royal Institution, and Parker, a stand-up comedian and part-time maths teacher at Queen Mary, University of London, decided that they could persuade others to share their enthusiasm by using the techniques of street entertainers.

"Unless you listen to Radio 4 or read particularly nerdy books or the nerdy bits of newspapers, you wouldn't necessarily ever hear anything about maths," says Parker. "We were looking for a new form of communication where we could approach people from scratch."

He says most mathematicians find maths incredible, but have put in years of study. He and Santos wanted to find a way of communicating the wonder of maths to people in streets and shopping centres who were prepared to do a lot less work.

The emphasis, therefore, is on entertainment and audience participation. A typical maths busking performance involves guessing someone's birth date by holding up five cards of repeated numbers and getting them to identify on which of the cards it falls. Or asking a volunteer to wear a waistcoat and a pair of handcuffs and try to turn the waistcoat inside out.

Finding the solution to the first involves binary numbers; to the second, topology, but members of the audience would not discover that unless they asked. Although performers wear distinctive yellow T-shirts declaring "Maths Busking" (see picture) and willingly pass on the url of a website that will give a rudimentary mathematical explanation and links to sites where people can learn much more, they do not go into detailed explanations on the spot.

"We are about changing people's thoughts about maths rather than trying to educate them," says Steve Humble, aka Dr Maths, who specialises in public awareness of maths and is the third founding member of the busking team. He says that maths buskers are principally there to entertain, and it doesn't matter if for more than half the audience entertainment is enough. "We talked long and hard about it before we agreed that the important thing was to engage everybody, even those who didn't want to know more," he says.

His mission is to dispel the fear of maths that people often pick up at school and to make maths as much a part of culture as art, music or literature.

Today a team of maths buskers hits Big Bang London, at Westminster Kingsway College, one of a dozen regional events aimed at inspiring young people towards careers in "stem" subjects (those related to science, technology, maths and engineering). Already the buskers have performed at the national Big Bang in Manchester, the Royal Society Summer Exhibition, and in a handful of smaller venues.

But their aim is not only to generate interest in maths among the general public, but also to produce a generation of maths teachers able to communicate their subject. They therefore hold regular training days for school and university teachers and others interested in learning busking techniques.

Tony Mann, head of the maths department at the University of Greenwich, who attended one of the training days and hosted another at his university for secondary school teachers and university staff and students, says those attending were principally there to find new ideas for engaging reluctant students. "Mathematics isn't always a popular subject," he admits. "If you can get people interested it helps enormously."

A report published last week by the Royal Society identified a significant lack of maths and science teachers in primary schools and an over-emphasis on "teaching to the test". It called for a "dramatic change in the standard and availability of science and maths training for primary teachers".

John Pethica, vice-president, said: "The Royal Society has serious concerns about science and maths education in the UK, which must be addressed if we are to inspire the next generation of scientists, engineers, mathematicians and technologists, produce a scientifically literate population, and capitalise on the economic opportunities offered by future science and technology."

Maths busking is an attempt to tackle this problem in quite a radical way. While science busking has been around for a number of years, Santos says that this essentially involves doing scientific experiments outside, while maths busking is much further removed from the classroom. She and Parker both admit that what they are doing remains a work in progress. Sometimes tricks that seem thrilling in development do not work so well in the street, and making the links between the performances and the maths behind them can be a challenge.

Then, not everyone is convinced that maths needs help. "There are some mathematicians who do fit the stereotype and have no intention of communicating with the public," says Parker. Santos says there have been one or two mutterings about dumbing down and harming the core mathematical skills. But she says when people see a performance and understand the potential for longer-term engagement with maths, they are usually won round.

Chris Budd, professor of applied mathematics at the University of Bath and education secretary of the London Mathematical Society, says maths busking should be seen as one of a variety of approaches for engaging people with maths, along with more formal methods such as popular lectures or science fairs. "A very strong message is to show that maths isn't just something you do in a classroom," he says. "It's out there affecting our lives and is actually fun." The idea is eventually to hold an annual maths week, and to train a network of buskers able to run shows and events during the week across the country. Ireland already holds such an event to which mathematicians from across the UK travel every year.

Meanwhile, the existing team is increasingly in demand from teachers desperate for ways to persuade their students that maths can be interesting.

Mann says he picked up both ideas and confidence, as well as the concept of keeping an audience permanently engaged rather than accept that every lecture must have its tedious bits. And perhaps the most useful lesson he drew from the experience had less to do with communicating maths than with successful stand-up comedy. "Matt was very good at dealing with disruption, such as latecomers, in a way that didn't upset them, but made sure they wouldn't be late next time," he said. "It's a useful approach for most teachers."

• This article was amended on 24 July 2010. The original referred to the mathematics of topography. This has been corrected to topology.