I taught in a range of schools for many years before moving into FE, where I found creative and imaginative approaches just as rewarding with adults. Most of my resources are concerned with giving control to the learner, through a range of methods. Some are great for just giving them experience of examination questions, and the chance to discuss these with other learners. I now concentrate on spreading the range of creations from UK KS1 to KS4, and across the Common Standards.
I taught in a range of schools for many years before moving into FE, where I found creative and imaginative approaches just as rewarding with adults. Most of my resources are concerned with giving control to the learner, through a range of methods. Some are great for just giving them experience of examination questions, and the chance to discuss these with other learners. I now concentrate on spreading the range of creations from UK KS1 to KS4, and across the Common Standards.
Maths GCSE Foundation & Higher. Surds & irrational numbers, three activities or investigations in shape and measure.
Finding the length of a the side of a square that leads to an irrational number.
Comparing ratios of paper sizes to derive the ratio of length to width for A4 paper.
Finding the area and perimeter of the pieces of a tangram.
All good stuff that leads the learner through different process to derive lengths and areas using surds, and to add and simplify with surds.
Needs knowledge of Pythagoras, which is KS3. So great for revising Pythagoras with surds.
I teach 16 plus learners in a thirty or so week programme for GCSE - some retake and some new learners. What I have done here is put the Edexcel Linear A new scheme into the weekly slots, and devided all the criteria/spec statements into Aims and Objectives. I wouldn't expect anyone to follow the same order, or keep my jokes, but please copy slides as you want.
Inspectors love to see the aims pasted up, so I use PowerPoint.
A simple little activity that can get the learners thinking - no more than a warm up. Ask the question, and show the second screen. You don't need to face the screen, just know the position of the cards. A learner tells you which cards (first, second, third etc.) contain the date of their birth. The rest is the puzzle!
Ordering of fractions for Year 3 of KS2. Revision of work in Year 2, then a PowerPoint presentation with identical worksheet. Use the PowerPoint as answers, or for class work on an interactive board. Great for discussion of equivalences, percentages or decimal equivalences.
Entirely suitable as revision in later years.
Specs:
'compare and order unit fractions, and fractions with the same denominators'
Notes and guidance (non-statutory)
They begin to understand unit and non-unit fractions as numbers on the number line, and deduce relations between them, such as size and equivalence. They should go beyond the [0, 1] interval.
Full lesson of activity.
Short presentation to define and demonstrate perimeter, with pages of activities, worksheets, and a full assessment based on previous SATs KS2. Colourful, and can be extended in many ways, with centicubes for example.
KS2 – Year 4 - Perimeter
Statutory requirements
Pupils should be taught to:
• measure and calculate the perimeter of a rectilinear figure (including squares) in centimetres and metres
Notes and guidance (non-statutory)
Perimeter can be expressed algebraically as 2(a + b) where a and b are the dimensions in the same unit.
Formulas begin in KS2 so by KS3 learners should be able to talk about what one is, and for, and to substitute into more sophisticated formulas.
A clear PowerPoint presentation that delivers a set of questions for the learners to answer as part of the lesson, and each with a clear answer. Ranges from very easy to a bit more complex.
Plus forty questions of increasing difficulty, arranged in a variety of views - one page, or two pages for more space for working, or two pages for differentiation.
Plus answers!
A full presentation, developing surds to show how to expand two brackets with surds, rationalising the denominator, and using the conjugate (difference of squares) to simplify expressions in number and algebra.
Plus two differentiated worksheets that give practice in application and reasoning.
A PowerPoint display with coloured creation of square numbers and triangular numbers, with a couple of other patterns thrown in for fun. An ideal activity for KS3 students.
Posters and Displays. I spent a rainy afternoon putting the GCSE maths specifications into Word Clouds using Wordle. Great little application.
And after that I shared it.
Solid shapes come up with reassuring regularity on GCSE papers, yet are often done badly, accoring to examiner's reports. Each time we struggle with a concept I make a net for the learners to cut out and hence aid understanding. The prism is very useful - I get the learners to write down as many questions as they can - volume, surface area, faces, vertices, edges, and so on. It works for us!
I'm a great believer in letting the learners look for themselves, so along with the formulae books I have lots of posters on display - &'teaching without talking&';, as we say.
Mostly Pure, or 'Core&', with a couple of Mechanics, all in pdf.
In this PowerPoint are a few questions to get learners to look at percentages from puzzles - the mathematics is not difficult, the learners simply need to consider creative approaches. The questions give everyday examples.
This is more of an idea than a set of resources. Having a young learner who struggled with both simple addition in his head, including counting on, and poor recollection of tables, I turned to dice games as a way of helping the learner to develop fluency and retention. I found some online, and I give an example from NRich here. But I also produced addition and multiplication grids, first up to six and then up to ten, for six sided dice and ten sided dice. We take turns to throw the two dice, and mark off the score on our grids, either on an addition grid or a multiplication grid. First one to four in a row, including diagonals, wins the game. Or three in a row if we are short of time - let the learners decide. And finally I've added some with addition for three dice - Bingo style cards with 3 to 18. Each card has one missing number, so there are eighteen in total, with numbers jumbled on each. It would be easy to devise simple tables for the difference between the two dice - I might try that next.
Let me know what you think. My young learner loves the games we devise, and his skills have come on wonderfully.
Two simple multiple-choice quizzes covering addition and subtraction. The first is simple halves, quarters and eighths; the second covers halves, third, sixths, fifths and tenths. Aimed at year 5, but great for revision in year 6 before they search for common denominators. And good for KS3 and KS4 revision.
Illustrated throughout, with answer slides after each question.
Dividing a fraction by a fraction.
Ever wonder why we 'flip and multiply'? Not many people seem to do so, and learners are too happy to follow the rules, and forget the rules. 'When do I do this and when do I do that?'
Here is a colourful diagrammatic presentation that recaps on dividing by unit fractions, then goes on to illustrate why we multiply by the denominator, and divide by the numerator, ie 'flip and multiply'. Give your learners the 'why' and they might remember the 'when'!
Questions at every point for class discussion and teacher explanation, and a set of questions at the end for learners to try, with full answers.
Plus differentiated worksheet, two exercises, one just proper fractions, one mixed numbers.
Full set of engaging activities to lead the learners to deriving methods and formulas for finding areas of triangles. Covers KS2 specs for Year 6, but good for revision and practice at any stage.
Lots of questions in the style of SATs from right across the range of papers. Great for revision, practice, or checking learning at later stages, for example KS3 or Foundation GCSE.
