I was recently asked for numeracy ideas which could be delivered to all departments across the curriculum as a hit of numeracy.
Below I’ve listed the ideas that came to mind.
Participation Pie Charts
When completing group work, as the pupils to draw or use an instant pie chart, where each colour represents each member of the group. They then represent their participation through proportions.
Check out our post Instant Graphs for instructions on how to make instant pie charts.
Where is the Maths?
Display subject related photos such as sprinters crossing the finish line in PE, Mondrian photos in Art, or a freeze frame from a Simpson’s episode (any they have a lot of maths) and pose the questions “where is the maths”?
Is …… a Mathematician?
Again use a subject related picture such as a picture of Heston for Food Technology is displayed along with the question “is Heston a Mathematician”?
Organising & Sorting
Ask pupils to organise or sort items, products, topics, keywords into groups. Use hula hoops to create venn diagrams. Ask pupils to justify their categories.
Ask Mathematical Questions
Is there a pattern?
Can you predict what is next?
What is your hypothesis?
What’s the same? What’s different?
Scrabble your Key words
I love this idea from Mr Collin’s check it out here. Ask pupils to create a list of topic keywords and using the scrabble value for each letter they find the total sum of each word. The student who find a topic related word with the highest score wins.
It’s that time of year again, revision is truly under way in preparation for the summer 2017 exam series. We have blogged before about revision techniques such as; revision relays, treasure hunts, and thoughts & crosses activities (Anything but more past papers…, Exam Warm Ups, Exam Technique, Maths Party and Intervention Evening). In this blog we look at other revision games;
Revision Pong Those that are regular party goers have probably played this game in a social yet competitive environment and adapting it for the classroom is quite easy and flexible in the way it’s played. You just need a set of plastic cups (numbered), a ping pong ball and a set of questions (also numbered).
It can be played as a team game (I recommend no more than 3 per team to avoid down time). If team gets the ball in a cup say number 4, they then answer question 4 to gain points, I give 10 points for correctly answered questions. In order to keep the other team, team B, involved they can also be calculating the answer to “steal the points” if team A get it wrong or alternatively gain bonus points (I award 5). Team B would have to prove to Team A they got it correct by showing their calculations (I provide each team with mini whiteboards).
Revision Hexagons
These great resources from @JR-Maths-Resources are not only beautifully presented and cover a range of topics, they are differentiated from fluency in the centre to reasoning and finally problem solving as the outside layer. I use these either daily as quick starters (they take around 10 minutes) or as short homework task.
Again some experimentation has led me to believe the best option here is to number the jenga pieces and use with a corresponding set of questions.You can see in the picture on the left that I do have a set of jenga pieces now dedicated to solving equations, but since numbering the pieces I’ve got a lot more use out of them! The game is played in the same way as the Jenna game, the only addition is that pupils must answer that question before they can remove that piece (if numbered, version on the left pupils would answer after removing it, if they get it wrong they go again). This can be differentiated, identifying the level of difficulty on the question card.
I create a revision carousel using a variety of different tasks, one at each of the stations for the topics in the carousel. The timer is set for 7 minutes at each station and pupils rotate through the stations in groups of 3-4. At each station they either answer the questions or taking part in the activity for example Fan & Pick. Therefore a verbal but brief explanation of each station is needed, and reminder notes on how it is played at each station also helps the carousel run smoothly.
Here is an example of a carousel I ran with 6 minutes at each station.
One of our favourite ways to revise, which we love is to use our revision foldables, check out our blog post Fold it to download it Revision Resources and click on the image below for our premium bundle of revision foldables.
This collect a joke resource requires pupils to perform increasingly difficult addition and subtraction of fractions. Watch out for the red herrings! Purchase it from here!
It is nearly Pi Day, March 14th (3.14), so to celebrate try some of our resources from the seasonal Pi Day bundle. This bundle consists of three resources described below.
A set of 16 relay race questions suitable for able KS4 pupils. The questions are progressively difficult, starting with the basics (see picture) to solving problems involving area, circumference or volume.
Print one set of questions for each group on different colours. Each group has a team captain, they retrieve the question from the front , taking it to the team to answer. Once they are confident they’ve got it correct they return it for marking. If correct they get 10 points and the next question. If they are wrong they can have a second attempt for 9 points.
The pupils must calculate progressively difficult fractions of amounts (suitable for KS3 pupils), each answer gives a letter spelling out the punchline to the Pi Day joke. This resources includes ‘red herrings’ for quick self and teacher assessment. This resource is free to download as part of try before you buy!
Pupils are challenged to use the clues to plot all five circles and find the point of intersection. They will need to use and inverse the formulas for the area and circumference of a circle, as well as some Pythagoras’ Theorem.
Each resource includes instructions, ideas for support/extension and solutions.
Colour by number is a well known childhood activity and in most cases requires no maths other than number recognition. Take for example this Halloween Scarecrow picture, which I have completed online using the Color It by Numbers website here. As you can see each number represents a particular colour and once finished the image is more defined.
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To add difficulty to this activity and make suitable for older children we’ve created our MathArt worksheets. Here is an example solution sheet, taken from our Halloween Maths: Simplifying Expressions Math Art resource.
In this type of activity pupils must answer the questions and then shade all the squares with that answer with the colour indicated, resulting in a Halloween picture. There are two different Halloween MathArt resources available in our Halloween Bundle.
To add further challenge and set a homework task, I use a blank and much simpler template such as this pumpkin picture taken from Coloritbynumber.com here, and ask pupils to create their own question with the correct answers placed in the grid. Pupils will need to group the questions by colour.
You could ask pupils to create a set of questions limited by topic area for example; BIDMAS, solving equations, area, perimeter, evaluating formulae, alternatively pupils could create it based on a number of topics recently studied. Their work (when checked) could then be given an a starter of homework activity for another class. Here is an the example I show the pupils;
We love relay races as a great team and review activity, check out our blog post here about how to run a relay race. A collection of relay races for all occasions, not just Halloween, can be downloaded from here made by Chris Smith @AAP03102.
The week ahead is the last week for many schools before the Christmas holidays and so we have collected some of our favourite Christmaths activities. We would also like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year which brings new and exciting developments for NumberLoving, watch this space!
Christmas Mysteries
Laura has created two mysteries called “how many elves” and “white Christmas”. Mysteries is a thinking skills activities in which pupils use the clue cards, organising the information, making calculations where necessary in order to answer the questions posed. These can be downloaded here .
How many elves?
In this task students must use knowledge of number, percentages and time to work out how many elves Santa needs to hire to make all the Christmas gifts on time!
White Christmas In this task students have to use the clues to work out where in the UK is most likely to have a white Christmas this year. All data is accurate. Students could then plot the places on a map to see if they notice any patterns in the probabilities they have calculated.
The Christmas Pirate Game
This game has been adapted from Mr Paul Collins original Pirate Game to give it a Christmas edge. The Christmas version of the game can be downloaded from TES here. Mr Collins blog of Christmas & maths activities is definitely worth checking out here.
Christmas Maths Relay Race
Chris Smith’s relay races include a Christmas themed relay race and can be downloaded from the TES here. For more details on how to run a relay race check out our post on using relays for revision here.
Graphing
Challenge your pupils to use graphing software to create a Christmas tree like this one on Desmos here.
Another Easter resource we would like to share!
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In this type of activity pupils must answer the questions and then shade all the squares with that answer with the colour indicated, resulting in a Halloween picture. There are two different Halloween MathArt resources available in our 
