How does everyone motivate year 11s who are capable of 7s but settle for 5s?

@mathspadnicola.bsky.social @mathspadjames.bsky.social nailing it again. I requested an addition to their website and a few days later, there it is. Incredible.

Delighted to see 1 included in my favourite probability lesson.

How does she find the time?!!?! Thank you!

I’m fairly sure that when I learnt these myself as a child I had no idea what ‘alternate segment’ meant, nor the relevance of chords in any of the theorems. I just memorised images I think. Understanding the language makes it so much easier!

In #mathstoday year 7 began converting recurring decimals to fractions by piecing together and manipulating 9ths, 99ths and 999ths. Such great fun!

Finding these videos useful and inspiring: www.ncetm.org.uk/maths-hubs-p.... Teaching maths really well often feels really hard. I’m guilty of resorting to ‘easy (less good) teaching’ but the video about full sentences is a useful reminder of simple deliberate practice that is highly effective.

MATHSPAD IS THE BEST! MATHSPAD IS THE BEST!

#Mathstoday Year 8 finished their section on simplifying expressions ending with adding x^2 types to the mix. They also got to do some finding expressions of perimeter questions.

In #mathstoday I enjoyed solving this problem posed by a colleague.

Great task after great task after great task! What a superb reminder many of the gems that exist!

Calling all Maths teachers! What are some of your all-time great tasks for secondary Maths? Ones that could have their place in any curriculum, one that should be studied in PGCE courses, ones that started whole new genres of tasks... ... or just ones you really like. (see some of mine below)

What a great resource! Keen to find more algebra tile resources if anyone knows of any. www.purposefulmaths.com has been great!

In #mathstoday I braved using algebra tiles to solve equations. Not sure of success, but looking forward to watching students playing around with more equations tmrw.

Sunday night seems the right time to post a gallery of (I hope!) every one of Catriona's geometry puzzles. notes.mathforge.org/notes/publis... Give it a moment to load ... there's a *lot* of them! #GeometryPuzzles #UKMathsChat #mathsky

In #mathstoday year 7 got excited about ‘anything’ to the power 0.

New! My 193rd gems post. Ideas, resources and updates for maths teachers. 💎 www.resourceaholic.com/2025/10/5-ma... Hat tips to follow. #mathstoday #ukmathschat

@tlmaths.bsky.social I’ve been trying to use your videos for the last couple of weeks and keep encountering this message. Is your website not currently available? It happens when I’m trying to access further integration on both chrome and safari. TIA.

I hate to sound like a broken record but I LOVE @mathspadnicola.bsky.social @mathspadjames.bsky.social!!! Mathspad makes children of all abilities THINK HARD.

Did you know I've been working on A-level content? I've managed to cover all of year 1 statistics now including in depth videos (a little over 6 hours worth), exam questions and solutions on each topic (117 full exam questions in total). All free, of course. www.1stclassmaths.com/alevelrevision

#mathstoday (But actually in a few weeks…) Best Christmathsy activities? I always enjoy a bit of curve stitching Christmas trees, but would love to hear what others get up to!

@catrionaagg.bsky.social teaching unknown mu and/or sigma today was brilliant. No procedural standardising at all. Just finding how many sigmas from the mean we are and then working from there. It all felt so much more intuitive than how I’ve done it previously. Thanks for all your help on this.

Notation help please. When approximating binomial with normal, should I be using a different letter? See image. Are both ok? Neither? Something else? @susanwhitehouse.bsky.social @mrsouthernmaths.bsky.social @tlmaths.bsky.social @danihosford.bsky.social

#mathstoday My exceptionally mathematically brilliant year 11s were wowed by the realisation that you could divide across numerators and denominators when dividing fractions.

#mathstoday I posed the diagonally cornerless chessboard problem (can a domino cover every square?) in 1st lesson on proof. Student tried to draw over the whole board, whilst we watched him fail, no one sure if it could be done or not. Then someone came up with beautiful proof which convinced us.

Anyone tried teaching normal dist without any mention if standardising until unknown mu and sigma occur? Having read @susanwhitehouse.bsky.social and @mrsouthernmaths.bsky.social book, I know their view is it’s a bad idea (so it probably is!), but I’m really tempted to try it.

I have a y9 student who has recently lost his sight. He cannot see anything on paper or a screen. He has the support of an LSA, and specialist training is due to take place asap. If you have experience of this, any advice on teaching maths to blind students would be much appreciated.

@mathspadnicola.bsky.social @mathspadjames.bsky.social I’ve missed mathspad over the summer. The use of colours on the digits and the blocks is wonderful. Are the blues equal? Yellows? Bringing decimals to life.

Any suggestions for good ice breaker games to help me learn names of year 8 tutor group tomorrow? TIA