About Me

About me

The Maths Zone is the blog of  Chris Olley. I have been a secondary school mathematics teacher since 1983. I have taught in a variety of mixed urban comprehensive schools leading up to a 7 year stint as head of department in South East London. I managed the PGCE course at Goldsmiths for 2 years. I have taught for 4 years in Uganda and Tanzania, teaching school students and working on in-service and pre-service teacher training. I am the co-author of a series of text books for secondary schools in Uganda. Finally, I have managed a variety of curriculum development and educational support projects, including Ocean Maths and Number Partners and I ran London maths events for maths year 2000. I was director of the PGCE secondary maths course at King’s College, London up to September 2016. I  am the maths lead for the BSTEM project providing equipment and in service training to Junior High Schools in Ghana. I now work as a freelance consultant engaging in a wide range of maths education development projects, through my consultancy.

Research

  • Middle management in secondary school mathematics.
  • Dynamic ICT supporting teaching and learning in mathematics.
  • Mathematics, Narrative and Orientation, engaging learners in school mathematics.

Publications

The Teaching and Assessment of Inquiry Competences. Rönnebeck S., Nielsen J.A., Olley C., Ropohl M., Stables K. 2018 In: Dolin J., Evans R. (eds) Transforming Assessment. Contributions from Science Education Research, vol 4. Springer.

The Concept of Competence and Its Relevance for Science, Technology and Mathematics Education. Ropohl M., Nielsen J.A., Olley C., Rönnebeck S., Stables K. 2018 In: Dolin J., Evans R. (eds) Transforming Assessment. Contributions from Science Education Research, vol 4. Springer.

School mathematical modelling: Developing mathematics or developing modelling? Olley, C. J., Feb 2015, Proceedings of the Ninth Congress of the European Society for Research in Mathematics Education. HAL, p. 910-916

Embedding Numeracy: Promoting numeracy across the curriculum in secondary schools. Olley, C. J., 2013, Optimus Education.

Modelling, Functions and Estimation: A Pizza Problem. Olley, C. J., 2011, Mathematics Education with Digital Technology. Oldknow, A. & Knights, C. (eds.). Continuum International Publishing Group, p. 163-174

School Mathematics for Uganda Secondary Schools Books 1-4. Olley, C. J. & Karugaba, J., 1996, Kampala, Uganda: Fountain Publishers Ltd.