Trial and Improvement

Tomorrow I am about to start teaching Trial and Improvement to my Year 9 class and realised that I don’t have any fun resources on this topic.

I did a Google search and found a nice website outlining some lesson ideas.

Here is a link to a lovely spreadsheet simulation that gets the idea across pretty quickly and links to this starter problem. Click on the image to take you to the online simulation.

Once your pupils are ok with this, you can play a class game where pupils win imaginary money for their estimates.

Click on the image below to take you to another interactive online game.

When they get really good, there is a more advanced version they can play.

Many thanks to Maths Online for providing these wonderful resources free of charge. We like that.

GCSE Revision Presentations

I have just added a new page here with some GCSE Higher Level Revision Quizzes that I made with Google’s own version of Powerpoint. You can access this here.

Formulae Booklet for A Level Edexcel

You can download a copy of the most recent formulae booklet for Edexcel here.

This version is for the exams from Jan 2009 onwards.

Statistical tables can be found within this booklet.

Stopwatch

Here is a lovely link to a great online Stopwatch that you can display in lessons to make pupils work to a time limit:

Graph Paper

There are loads of different websites that enable you to make many kinds of graph paper. Often the results are not pleasing after they have been printed.

Today I was printing off some isometric dotty paper for one of my classes and found this excellent site (Sharpe Maths) that allows you to specify the dot or line thicknesses and colours that you require.

Estimates

This Eyeballing game tests your skills at making judgments about where the midpoint of a line is, making right angles and the like. Nice for a lesson starter on accuracy.

Excel and Maths

Here is a lovely resource of Excel files that you can download and use interactively in class. You have to enable macros in order to run their content. They are very nice to use and look good.

C2 Algbraic Fractions and Polynomials

Here is a really nice polnomial division applet  from Waldo maths that enables students to work through division problems by themselves step by step.

Here is a link to a powerpoint that approaches division from another angle. I like this method a lot for division of cubics by a linear expression.

Experimental Probability

Live Simulations:

Spinner - finding a probability

Dice and spinner simulation - relative frequency

Drawing 10 marbles from a box

All the above were taken from a lesson on the Virtual Manipulatives Website

Primes, Odds and Evens

Worksheet:

GCSE Questions on Primes, Odds and Evens