Primary Maths

How to…prepare for the new times tables test

In January, the UK Government announced plans to test every pupil in England on their times tables before leaving primary school. An effective way to prepare pupils for the new times tables tests is by using the new Collins' Times Tables Simulator Read More

Presenting Data – How your students can display detail

As sad as it may seem, these days no one seems to have enough time to look at things in detail, from text language to finding information, we want to know what we need to know as quickly as possible. Maths has been doing this for some time now with… Read More

Maths – Probability

Even if we don’t recognise it, many of the decisions we make each day are based on probability. Subconsciously, we often question the decisions we make on probability in order to ‘improve’ our chances, sometimes beneficially, at other times not. Activity One – Daily Decisions (suitable for Years… Read More

Investigations

Investigations are more common to our work in science but they can prove invaluable in maths in helping pupils to understand mathematical reasoning. In these activities the pupils are presented with puzzles to solve and in doing so they will gain greater understanding of some key concepts. Activity One –… Read More

Maths Countdowns

Countdowns are fun, nerve-wracking and prepare us for something exciting that will happen when we get to zero. In this series of activities we look at countdowns, which, at this time of year includes the countdown to Christmas, most often denoted in the chocolate advent calendar. Read More

Fibonacci Day – 23rd November

Leonardo Fibonacci lived in the 12th and 13th century and was considered the greatest western mathematician of the Middle Ages. He helped to replace Roman numerals with the Arabic ones we know today but his most famous legacy is the Fibonacci Series, a number sequence from which comes a number known variously as the Golden Mean, the Golden Number or the Golden Ratio which mirrors the proportion seen in nature and perceived beauty. In this series of activities, pupils will investigate the sequence and see how the numbers discovered can be found in nature. Read More

World Maths Day: 14th October 2015

World Maths Day is a fabulous way to celebrate the world of maths but there’ll be some for whom maths isn’t their favourite subject and a maths day may be their idea of torture. Planning World Maths Day to not just be a day of maths will help… Read More

KS1 Enrichment Games

In KS1 it’s imperative that we put maths into a practical perspective. Giving little ones maths in written form is too abstract and detaches them from the understanding of using maths in the real world. There are many ways to enrich KS1 maths with games and here we… Read More

Maths – Enrichment Games

Maths is fun to many anyway but you can make it even more fun and develop a deeper understanding of the processes involved by introducing more fun and practical activities. There are many ways to introduce fun activities and here, we share six of our favourites. Activity One: Function Steps… Read More

Maths – Scaling up

Some tasks can be mind-numbingly tedious but sometimes have to be done. Here, we pose some questions that the more curious pupils might ask and set about answering them in an easy and roughly accurate way. Activity: Scaling Up Suitable for: Year 3 to Year 6 Learning… Read More