An experienced Primary & Secondary Maths teacher. Enjoying promoting and sharing my resources on TES. I embed problem solving, Maths Mastery and Magenta Principles into my lessons. I love fun and interactive elements which help engagement as long as challenge and assessment is built into this. Please do leave reviews if you find my resources useful. Thank you.
An experienced Primary & Secondary Maths teacher. Enjoying promoting and sharing my resources on TES. I embed problem solving, Maths Mastery and Magenta Principles into my lessons. I love fun and interactive elements which help engagement as long as challenge and assessment is built into this. Please do leave reviews if you find my resources useful. Thank you.
The colour sheet prints out on A4 (card and laminate if you can). Get the sheets to each table of four and give them the apparatus (counters, dice, coins) and ask them to choose which game they think they want to play (and which game they would like to be the host of). I tried it without giving them any lessons on probability space diagrams before hand as I gave it as a problem solving lesson for them to come up with ways of finding all the outcomes themselves.
Thanks to helbel11 for this. She has got a version of it up on TES which I like and it gave me the idea...It's very good. However, after I'd downloaded it I decided to make it a little easier for one of my classes. Hence the attached which has simpler experiments for the students to investigate.
This is just a picture of a brain on A4. You write the topic title or the question on the left and then print out. (You could duplicate the page and then print both onto A4 so each is A5). Each student then fills it with what they know. e.g.
**At the start of a lesson to recall everything they remember from yesterday, etc.
**During the lesson to summarize or capture all the key information from e.g. a presentation or fact sheet.
**At the end of the lesson to recap everything they've learnt.
I've edited the picture of the brain to make it easier to write on with less bits to fill in. The student's can order their writing around the brain in any order they choose.
It's not my idea and I've not use it yet so interested in any feedback.
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Thanks to tsyczynski another valued TES contributor for this. I really liked his idea of the homework tasks. I've just adapted it to fit in with our current theme of child labour in Victorian factories and I've given it to my class as an extended project task for a couple of afternoon lessons where we've got quite a few extra-curricular activities going on.
This is what they said about doing this kind of task:
"It's good to let your imagination flow"
"It's more fun"
"It's good to make something"
" I like choosing what to do"
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There are eight really good questions written by my students from their homework. I've chosen the best eight and graded them using "SkiRoute" Difficulty (See my other resources).
The questions are laid out for 2x4 labels. Give a sheet of 8 questions to each table and they can choose which of the eight they wish to answer (self differentiation).
Alternatively use the PowerPoint and display them - several versions on your preferred preference for displaying the answers.
The Original Homework task sheet is also included.
Enjoy.
If you like this then do check out my many other Maths activities listed on my TES Resources shop and pages including many Premium resources which will save you lots of time and give you some useful ideas. If you find this helpful then please do leave a constructive review so that others can benefit from your experience. Thank you.
I made these to help me save time when marking the books- If I wrote it several times one day I went home and made a sticker for it.. You need to buy the appropriate sized stickers. I got mine from eBay. The one I use the most is "Extra Challenge" which saves you having to write "Here is an extra challenge for you to do". Hope they help you too!
There are sixteen pairs of expressions on the target board. Students have to identify the sixteen pairs. This can be done as a target board whole class activity or printed onto card and cut out to allow tables or pairs to match the cards.
Short PowerPoint which challenges misconceptions when matching & simplifying algebraic expressions.
Pupils can write their answers (and then show the correction) on individual pupil whiteboards - either on own, in pairs or in tables of four.
Pupils can use red, green, yellow (for don't know) cards to show their answer. For extra fun you can have them point "Usain Bolt Style" to the left or right of the room for their answer. For complete chaos you can have them run to the left of the right of the classroom for yes or no.
The important thing is to get pupils to explain their answers to help everyone's understanding.
You can quite easily and quickly add many more questions by simply duplicating a yes or no slide and adding in your changes.
I would usually back this exercise up with a worksheet or textbook exercise which they can do independently afterwards.
You can extend this by getting the pupils to make up their own slides (on their whiteboards) to test other pupils.
Here are 11 questions on a SMART Notebook (also presented as a PDF if you don't have SMART)
At the end of the topic one of my classes wrote questions to show what they understood about Scatter graphs. The SMART Notebook is the result of this.
Also included is a worksheet to match the questions and a set of answers.
My suggestions are: Give the worksheet out. Allow them some time to answer. Then give them the Senteo Handsets and get them to close their books. Answer the quiz with the handsets as individuals. Then reset the quiz and allow them to complete it again - either in table groups of four or with their books to help them.
Finally get them to write explanations to each question in their book to prove/reinforce their understanding.
If you like this then please check out my many other Maths activities listed on my TES Resources shop and pages including many Premium resources which may be able to save you lots of time and give you some useful ideas. If you find this helpful then please do leave a constructive review so that others can benefit from your experience. Thank you.
A bundle of worksheets for mastering the language and knowledge of squaring and square numbers...Then....a bonus of a maze worksheet where students have to find their way through a maze using a path of only square numbers. This is a top quality way to engage and amuse the students - particularly in afternoon lessons or at the end of the term.
Once they have got the idea with the smaller maze they can attempt the bigger one - this will keep them busy for hours! (well most of the lesson with any luck).
If you like this then please check out my many other Maths activities listed on my TES Resources shop and pages including many Premium resources which may be able to save you lots of time and give you some useful ideas. If you find this helpful then please do leave a constructive review so that others can benefit from your experience. Thank you.
All the key words I think my (Y7) class need for looking at Divisibility.
There are two resources:
>The cards are ready for printing out on card and then cutting out to use for card match table collaborative group exercise. Top Tip - get them to place the keywords in alphabetical order to match your answer sheet!
> The worksheet is simply a copy for them to stick into their exercise books as notes. Get them to highlight all the key bits which are important to them. Use a copy of this for checking the answers on the card match.
The cards can be printed out onto three different colour cards which make it easier for them to match a key word with its definition and the example.
If you have time it would be worth grouping the keywords into difficulty levels and then only giving a subset to the lower ability tables or middle ability tables. Alternatively do what I'm going to do and give a full card set to each mixed ability tables.
This is an absolutely quality resource which I'm really chuffed with. It totally ticks loads of boxes for what is expected in our lessons - group work, discussion, mastery, self choice, differentiated, etc.
It uses elements of Connect, Arrange, Classify, Reduce and Act it Out of the Magenta Principles.
Here are 21 statements about Pythagoras which are either TRUE, FALSE or SOMETIMES TRUE .
They are appropriate for any students who have learnt how to do long side, then short side questions and mixed combination two-step questions.
The activity is designed to be a MATHS MASTERY activity where they consolidate their learning and prove that they understand and can explain their understanding.
The statements are graded in difficulty using "SkiRouteCodes" from Green, Blue, Red and Black. Students can choose which grade question to answer themselves or you could suggest their choices. The grades are slightly subjective (I wrote 21 out questions and then tried to sort them into the four grades). I have written a set of suggested solutions. Do let me know if I have made any errors with these.
You will note that I set work out to print onto label stickers. This saves the students time and helps keep the exercise books tidier. There is a header label, then the questions on labels and a set of solutions. I've also included the SkiRoute choices labels. There is also another copy of the Questions not on stickers to make it easier for you to adapt them.
I have also added in a copy of the questions ready for printing onto card and cutting up. You would then give the whole set out to a small group who would use the TRUEFALSEHEADER to catagorise all the cards.
One of the Magenta Principles is to reduce so there is an activity to reduce the pythag definition to as few words as possible.
Another one of the Magenta Principles is to "Act it Out" so you will find a task sticker for that along with a Storyboard template.
To show "Maths Mastery" students need to be able to explain what they do. The last three resources are a series of questions on sticky labels. Students can choose (self-differentiate) which questions to answer. The LO label is also there to go above the sticker. A set of the questions just as a worksheet is also included. No answers are included as it's difficult to write solutions for these. I would normally set these as the last activity of the lesson and then I would mark them after the lesson. Next lesson they could then start with responding to what improvement feedback I gave them.
The True False cards also have a PowerPoint presentation which is good to display and discuss each one in turn with the group.
Currently we are all about achieving mastery in Maths at our school. An INSET course gave me some descriptors for the different levels. A moment of enlightenment :) gave me the idea of using Po the Kung Fu Panda as the ideal character as he is on his way to achieving Mastery like Grand Master Oogway.
The Grade descriptors PPT give a poster to display for learners to understand where they are going. (The SMART notebook is just the creation file for the image in case you wish to change it slightly).
I've used the SkiRoute differentiation for some time. The idea is that you grade questions or tasks in difficulty and then you either tell your learners which level to choose or allow them to choose themselves. They obviously aspire to be able to do the black route hardest questions and it gives them a sense of achievement when they can.
Another idea I've been using is asking them to write their own questions which can be then used to give to the rest of the class. This seems to work quite well as an end of lesson plenary as it can give a really good indication of what level they are confident at. It also gives you a great opportunity to write a positive comment and then an action task challenge for the learner to respond to at the start of the next lesson. See attached sticker example.
Fun exercise for many age ranges. Will provide a good amount of discussion and is a nice next step after estimating and experimental probabilities.
Originally I used this as one short activity in a "Circus" of many activities which students go around the room playing on. (More of my Circus Activities are uploaded on my TES resources elsewhere).
There are several versions of the task here which you can adapt for your learners. The basic idea is that you give a sheet of card with a grid printed onto it. Players roll coins on to the card and if the coins land so that the side sides of the coin are not touching the sides they win. One idea is you give them a variety of size grids (e.g. grid A and grid B) where the coins do or don't fit in easily.
I prepare a set of game boards (A & B) for each pair of students and give them a money bag with 7 plastic toy coins in (1p, 2p, 5p, 10p, 20p, 50p, £1). You could use real money or even £2 coins if you have them.
2p is a large coin but isn't worth much so its makes it hard to win, but if you only win your stake back then you don't win much.
£2 is a large coin and is worth lots so its makes it hard to win, but if you only win your stake back then you win loads.
If you are doing this as a 10 minute circus activity then keep it simple. If you are doing it as a more extended piece of work then use the updated task sheet which asks the students to work out how to make the most money. Higher students will need encouragement to keep the game rules simple. Lower students will need encouragement to keep it really simple. You may choose to give them a reduced version of the problem.
You can see that I then for the next lesson typed their suggestions into a worksheet which they then started the next lesson by answering the worksheet. I think there is a lot of potential here to really develop the idea of how to test the games... e.g. they need to try 100 goes with each size coin, etc.
The activity certainly gets them discussing whether games are 'attractive' to play and so will bring in more money. The students usually feel that a high prize will make people want to play - even if the game is difficult to win. You could easily extend this activity into GCSE level maths to work out the profits possible.
4 pages of terms and descriptions. 99 terms in all.
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Here are two sets of domino loop cards. You can use them for starters and then back them up with the matching worksheet or use as a plenary and then use the matching worksheet as the next days starter.
You print them onto A4 card and cut them out. Then shuffle and give a set to your students. They have to rearrange the cards into a line order by matching the question to the answer. They are all questions like "The probability of getting a six on a fair die is..."
The first set has 22 cards and the second (which is longer to complete and the questions are harder as well) has 34 questions.
Afterwards (I like to get something into the student exercise books) there are matching worksheets where some of the questions have to be reworked out and written onto the sheets before the sheet is stuck in. There are two versions of each worksheet (One has more answers to put in so you can give to your quicker students).
All in you are getting two sets of domino cards, each with two matching worksheets. Solutions to the domino cards and the worksheets are included!
You could easily modify each of these card sets and WS to reduce the questions down to less for your lower/slower students.
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Originally I used this as a short 10 minute activity as part of a whole lesson of many circus activities (many other of my circus activities are listed on TES resources) however you can easily build a whole lesson around it.
"Will it snow this Christmas?" is the question. First just ask this question. Then give them the last five years weather data. Make a choice again. Then give more data from last 24 years. Then ask them to make a choice again. Then give them the answer sheet.
This is a good activity to provide lots of discussion. If you put the cards into sealed envelopes then it adds to the engagement and hence motivation. Its the sort of activity which looks great when being observed - particularly if you get some good discussion. You may wish to edit the city names to somewhere near your school. I made up the data but you could easily find the records of a city on the web. You may need a discussion about what constitutes snowing on Christmas day (e.g. snow flakes falling on the roof of the local BBC news building). You could bring in about how people bet on this happening.
It may be worth adding in some question prompts like:
How do you know this?
Why do you think that?
Are you absolutely sure? Can you prove it?
Can you now explain to me why you think that!
What evidence do you have about that one?
You could put these prompts onto cards and ensure the students use them during the activity.