The internet for teachers, blessing or curse? In the past, you would have a set of text books or work cards as your basic resource. The department would have bought a small library of additional books and materials from people like the ATM. If you needed a good idea, you would never have to look beyond the maths office or the maths cupboard (do you still have those?) Every department would have a pile of good physical manipulatives like centicubes and logic blocks, cuisenaire rods and probability kits. A set of large compasses and ruler for board work and a good collection of games and puzzles for activity days. There would be copies of those wonderful books by Brian Bolt (which are still available) for practical problem solving and a set of Points of Departure books for maths investigations. Always excellent, always to hand. Continue reading Finding Good Maths Resources
All posts by Chris
Exam Maths versus School Maths
When Ofsted look for continuous progress in maths lessons, what subject is it that they are thinking of? When SLT make 10 minute snap observations in which they expect to see students making progress, are they talking about the subject we know as mathematics? In the introduction to the Horizon episode on the proof of Fermat’s last theorem, Wiles describes the process of doing mathematics very beautifully (YouTube Link). Martin Gardiner described that wonderful moment when you realise you have found a solution as an Aha Moment (Article). Cleary, Ofsted and SLT are not talking about this subject, because they would know that moving forward mathematically requires an indeterminate period of struggle, followed by a dramatic shift. Progress modeled not by a linear function, but by a step function. Continue reading Exam Maths versus School Maths
Rubiks Maths for GCSE Revision
We’ve just finished work on updating the Rubik’s maths service so that it acts as a direct, complete GCSE revision tutor. The centrepiece is a neatly arranged assessment and practice system for National Curriculum Maths. A smart space theme is used for the navigation … choose the Planet (e.g. Algebra), then the Continent (e.g. sequences) to find a nice self marking, auto updating, flash based assessment package. If you make mistakes there are web links and video resources to give your practice opportunities (and, if you have a MyMaths licence, links to these resources). Continue reading Rubiks Maths for GCSE Revision
The New HP39GII
I’ve now had a good time to work with the new HP39GII graphing calculator.
It is exactly what you would want if you have been using HP39/40GS or a TI84 or a Casio FX9750 and you are ready for a really fast processor, tons of memory, a grey scale hi-resolution screen and batteries that last forever. The HP39/40GS series is a classic graphing calculator with a very smooth operating system built around apps all of which are controlled by the three ‘multiple representations’ keys … symbolic, plot and table. The HP39GII works in exactly the same way, so you know straight away what to do. But everything works really well. On the home screen calculations can be shown in textbook display with quotients and indices shown correctly. Divisions are shown fraction form where needed and an approx key comes up which converts to a decimal approximation. The graphing screen is superb. Clear smooth lines, clear dark axes and subtle grey grid lines. Pressing the + or – keys zooms in and out. Everything happens really fast. Continue reading The New HP39GII
Why Learn Maths
Just before Easter I ran a session for the A Level mathematics groups in the Harris Academy group in South East London. I can tell you it was pretty daunting in the small hall, but with something like 120 sixth form students, who had chosen me over another talk, about options, I think. However, can I publicly thank (a) the teachers at Harris Crystal Palace who invited me and most especially (b) the students who attended for reminding me what fun it is to talk about maths to young people. I’ll be applying for a teaching job again, next … Continue reading Why Learn Maths
Central London Maths Trail
Now that the weather has turned out so lovely, why not do the central London maths trail. I have rebranded it as the ATM/MA London branch trail and corrected all of the errors identified in our try out walk last month. Thanks to everyone who contributed.
Click to download a copy of the updated trail in docx Central london Trail or in pdf Central London Trail PDF. Continue reading Central London Maths Trail
Cape Town Maths
Two weeks ago, I had a very nice trip down to Cape Town. It is a very beautiful city indeed. However, I did a series of sessions mixing HP Graphing Calculators, GeoGebra and Data Streaming to groups of maths teachers, trainee maths teachers and undergraduate engineering students at the Cape Penninsula Technical University and the University of the Western Cape. South Africa, in the post apartheid era has been trying to bring all of its education systems up to the level of the former elite schools. As you can imagine, this is a tough 
task, although the government’s commitment is clear having one of the highest proportional spends on education anywhere in the world. The universities I visited are excellent examples of that move to change and I was delighted to work with really enthusiastic students and teachers. Additionally, the campuses are equipped with state-of-the-art facilities, including innovative sensory play equipment, further enhancing the learning environment. If you’re interested in learning more about innovative sensory play equipment, you can check out this site at https://timbertrails.co.uk/why-timber-trim-trail-equipment-is-beneficial/. For more resources on primary school education at https://www.primaryschoolresources.org.uk/outcome/psed. Continue reading Cape Town Maths
Brunel AND Nelson in King’s
The ATM/MA london Branch was treated to on of Peter Ransom’s barnstorming performaces last Saturday. A big message that we share with our PGCE students is that teaching is a performance art and ensuring that your lessons have a good dose of theatre will bring students in to your message. Well, Peter brings avery big dose of theatre. Right down to the brilliant stand-up touches … is he really going to drop the cannon ball? Well, yes, naturally. We got through transformational geometry, force functions in suspension bridge chains, cannon ball stacking sequences and the destructive impact of cannon balls by linear and quadratic scaling. So, no messing maths. Please come back soon to see the photos … and come to our next session which will be 10:30 Saturday 24th March (King’s College London, the Franklin Wilkins Building on Stamford Street, SE1, just down from the IMAX cinema), which is the Danny Brown maths Workshops. Read all about it at Danny’s site: www.makemaths.com
Maths Trails
The ATM/MA London branch meeting today was a wander round Parliament Square, up Whitehall and Round Trafalgar Square. Four groups of maths teachers made the trek and were intrigued to see this most famous bit of London in a different light. The trail is one of a number that I prepared during my time working for maths Year 2000 and it’s great to see it used again. To support the session, I set up a new web sight with the great URL of www.mathstrails.org.uk . You’ll find PDF and Word versions of all of my trails plus links and details of a load of other trails and trail related materials. Please visit and most especially, please contribute, you maths trail fans with your own ideas, materials and stories.
In the end, it’s just great to get out and about and look at things in a different way. So, take the opportunity and get your students out too!
Mathematics <> Calculating
There is much to agree with in Conrad Wolfram’s lecture in TED.
In Uncle Petros and Goldbach’s Conjecture Doxiadis’ main character refers to anything in a mathemaical problem that could be done by a machine as ‘shopping maths’. Wolfram has the same view and asserts that we should focus on those elements in the problem solving process that are NOT shopping maths. So far, so good. The problem is that Wolfram is stuck in a world that sees practical problem solving as somehow mathematical. He even uses the tired example of keeping track of your mortgage. Clearly people actually do this by looking at their statement and seeing how much they are paying, they do not engage with the calculations required to analyse the payments. As he says, in the real world, solutions are messy. The trick is (a) to develop opportunties to solve such messy problems in a school setting while keeping them real and (b) to put learners into settings where they actually care about the outcomes to the problems. Serious past experience does not auger well for the possibilities.
It is also troubling that doing mathematics by hand is ridiculed quite so comprehensively. Those quirky souls in the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences at Cambridge had chalk boards fitted in the seminar rooms, specifically to ensure that they can do their mathematics by hand. The problem for Wolfram is that he sees mathematical activity as necessarily applied. He is right to critique a school curriculum which is essentially a curriculum in pure mathematics dressed up as somehow useful, with a cloth of applicationm draped over an algorithm exercise. However, that does not mean that we should only be solving problems coming from the ‘real-world’, implying the entirely mathematical, i.e. pure-maths world is not why we should be teaching maths.
It is a genuinely good thing to see these sentiments aired and tempts the next steps … (i) an inclusive view of mathematics as an end in itself and a language for application, and (ii) a critical, credible view of how such thinking can be formatted for an institutional, compulsory, age specific, school system such as we work with.