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In each block of the maze, students are given a value and a percentage they should increase it by. An answer is given (the large number in each block). Students try to find a way through the maze, left to right, that only goes through correct answers (moving diagonally is not allowed!). Solutions provided.

A basic worksheet to ensure students are comfortable with the > and < symbols. Students are given 2 calculations to do, and must use the appropriate symbol to show which calculation gives the greater answer. The calculations involve integers at first, but move onto decimal calculations later. Solutions are provided.

As there isn’t any new content to learn when studying Surds in Year 12, I wanted to find a way to make my lesson a bit more interesting - hence this relay. I’ll let my students get stuck into this straight away (in teams) so I discover what they can/can’t do - far better than standing at the front teaching them things they already know! Questions are differentiated by difficulty (1, 2 and 3 stars). The questions are in a completely random order, so Question 20 (for example) isn’t necessarily harder than Question 8. I’ve included answers, and I’ve also included the Word version of the relay in case you want to make any changes, e.g. if you disagree with my difficulty rating!

This Powerpoint covers the 5 Sampling Techniques covered in Chapter 1 of the Applied Textbook for Edexcel Year 12 / AS Maths, namely: Simple Random Sampling Systematic Sampling Stratified Sampling Quota Sampling Opportunity Sampling To try and make the content a little bit more interesting, I introduce these techniques using Skittles (eating them is a nice treat at the end of the lesson!).

A Tarsia puzzle that covers “simple” Trig. Equations such as 4 sin x = 1. A few of the equations require knowledge of the identity tan x = sin x / cos x. Students solve the equations and match them up to the answers on another piece. When completed, all the pieces join up to make a hexagon. As space on the puzzle pieces was limited, I’ve used a code to tell students the range in which they are looking for solutions. For example, if an equation is followed by (A), they are looking for all solutions between 0 and 360 degrees. You will need to display the code on the board whilst students complete the puzzle. I wasn’t able to upload the Tarsia file, just a pdf copy of the puzzle pieces, so you won’t be able to edit the task, sorry.

As there isn’t really any new content to learn when studying Indices in Year 12, I wanted to find a way to make my lesson a bit more interesting - hence this relay. I’ll let my students get stuck into this straight away (in teams) so I discover what they can/can’t do - far better than standing at the front teaching them things they already know! Questions are differentiated by difficulty (1, 2 and 3 stars). The questions are in a completely random order, so Question 20 (for example) isn’t necessarily harder than Question 8. I’ve included answers, and I’ve also included the Word version of the relay in case you want to make any changes, e.g. if you disagree with my difficulty rating!

A short matching task on the Area of a Circle in terms of Pi. Students calculate the area of each circle, and cross off the answer in the grid at the bottom. It will probably take your students only 5 minutes to complete! Task is available as a pdf or as a powerpoint, in case you want to make any changes.

This activity is inspired by something I saw on the Mathspad website, but I wanted a simpler version to use in a first lesson with Year 7 on expanding double brackets. There are therefore no negatives in this activity, and the leading coefficient in the quadratics you obtain is always 1. The students are given a table of algebraic expressions and 15 quadratics they are trying to create. They pick 2 expressions from the table, multiply them together and see if they’ve created one of the quadratics. If not, they try again! Each expression can only be used once, although most expressions appear multiple times in the table. I’ve used this with a mixed ability Year 7 group, and it worked well. Weaker students can pick expressions at random and see what they get, whereas stronger students may start with the quadratic and ask themselves how they can create it - essentially factorising quadratics! Solutions are provided.

This is similar to a resource already on TES that I really like (/teaching-resource/gcse-maths-sequences-search-worksheet-6158880) but I wanted an activity that required more substitution into nth terms rather than pattern-spotting, so this is what I came up with. Students have to find the 1st, 2nd, 5th, 10th, 50th and 100th terms of sequences using the given nth terms. They cross off all of their answers in the grid above. For ease of marking, there will be 10 numbers left over in the grid after the activity is completed. Students should add these together, and if they’ve made no mistakes, they’ll get a total of 1000. Full solutions are still provided however!

I really liked Don Steward’s task on equable parallelograms (https://donsteward.blogspot.co.uk/2017/11/equable-parallelograms.html) but wanted some questions that were a little bit easier for my Year 10 group, so I designed these. In each of paralleograms on the sheet, the area is equal to the perimeter. Students should use this fact to set up an equation, which they can solve to find the value of the unknown. Solutions are provided.

A task I used with more able Year 8 students. Students are given decreasing arithmetic sequences - but most of the terms are missing. They must first determine the missing terms, and then work out the nth term. Solutions are provided.

A basic worksheet to ensure students are comfortable with the equal to and not equal to symbols. They have to check my answers to various calculations and put the appropriate symbol in the gap. Starts with calculating with integers, then addition/subtraction of decimals, then adding fractions, and finally multiplying/dividing decimals. Solutions provided.

A presentation I designed to help me deliver the “Number Families” task from nrich (https://nrich.maths.org/13123). Rather than jumping straight in to set notation, it starts off getting pupils to list what they know about certain numbers. Then they imagine that numbers that share a certain property can be placed in the same “bucket”. This idea of a “bucket” is then used to introduce set notation.

This was inspired by a task from Don Steward: https://donsteward.blogspot.com/2014/12/algebraic-product-puzzles.html I wanted some similar puzzles on Quadratics that were more accessible to weaker students, without any negative terms, so that’s what I created! Students have to fill in each blank cell with a bracket so that every row and column multiplies to make the quadratic expression at the end. Of course this could be done by random trial and error, but it makes much more sense to factorise the Quadratics! An example is given on the sheet to help students understand how the puzzles work. Answers are provided.

A quick (less than 30 mins) investigation that I did with my Year 7s on Semiprimes.

8 Time Series graphs and questions to accompany them. As well as questions on basic graph reading skills, I’ve also included questions that test other skills, for example averages, percentage increase, and writing one amount as a fraction of another. Solutions to all questions are provided. It’s possible to get all questions on one doubled-sided piece of A4 if you print 2 pages per sheet. Apart from the football-related graphs, all data is completely fictional! I’ve also uploaded the word documents so you can make any changes, if desired.

An activity that gets students to practise finding fractions of amounts, which also introduces an element of problem solving. Students create their own questions. They pick a numerator, pick a denominator, and work out that fraction of the large number at the top of the screen. They’re aiming to create calculations with the given answers on the screen. Some students might pick their fractions completely at random, whereas others may approach things a bit more logically… There are 6 different activities, with varying degrees of difficulty. Some answers can be made via more than one calculation, but I’ve made a suggestion on how to complete each problem.

Used with an able Year 10 group as a way to revise factorising into single brackets. Students are given a partially completed multiplication grid with algebra, and must deduce what expressions go in the remaining boxes. As a starting point, look at the 3rd column: by factorising 6x + 8 and 15x + 20, we deduce that (3x + 4) must go at the top of this column. Solutions are provided.

Inspired by “The Simple Life” - a task from Colin Foster: https://nrich.maths.org/13207 I wanted a simpler version to suit my weaker group. Students are given a variety of algebraic expressions in the form a(bx + c) and must pick 2 to add up. They are given 8 answers to aim for. Possible solutions are provided - there may be other solutions, I’m not really sure!

A treasure hunt based on ratio questions like: Hugh and Kristian share some money in the ratio 9:7. Hugh gets £10 more than Kristian. How much does each person get? Students pick their own starting point, answer the question, and look for their answer at the top of another card. This tells them which question to answer next, and then they repeat the process. They should end up back at their starting point if they get all 20 questions correct. Solution provided.