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to > teachers > links to the best websites in the world!
A new maths website seems to pop up every day, and yet whenever you
type "good maths websites"
into Google, the same old characters pop up all the time.
The aim of this section is to offer up some of the sites that I have
found invaluable over the last couple of years. As well as the well-known
classics, I will also try to unearth a few lesser-known gems for you.
And best of all, they are all free!
As with the resources, should you know of any must-visit websites
that I have left out, please let me know here
Please Note: A collection
of websites targeted specifically for pupils can be found here
NEW FEATURE: I have
recorded a series of 5 minute videos taking you on a tour of some
of my favourite websites. Click here
to take a look!
The
Best of the Maths Blogs
I have a great deal of admiration for people who can maintain
a Blog - I tried myself, made 3 entries, then promptly closed
it. The following Blogs are my favourites. I visit them at least
once a week, and where possible I subscribe to them so that
I get notified each time a new entry is posted. This is now
my Number 1 way of keeping up to date with the latest ideas,
resources and developments in teaching. They are fascinating
reads by talented, generous people, that give me amazing ideas
and save me bucket loads of time. I hope you find them useful
as well.
A
fascinating Maths blog written by two teachers, full of brilliant
maths ideas and links to resources. And not content with conquering
the world of blogging, there is now a resource
website too! I am more than slightly jealous.
One
of the first mathematics blogs I discovered, and still one of
the best around. Regularly updated with links to some of the
most exciting and innovative maths resources, ideas and practices.
A must visit.
Quite
a grand name for a blog, but I am pleased to say that William
Emney lives up to his billing. Loads of great ideas and links
to fantastic resources
An
excellent blog by Damian Watson. On his profile, Damian says:
"I love teaching and learning! I want to try different
approaches and get the best for my students". You can't
say fairer than that!
One
of the best Blogs and top of the Websites. The resource bank
here is truly phenominal. You won't find many boring PowerPoints
and worksheets. Oh no, on Number Loving you will come across
mysteries, collective memories, treasure hunts, top trumps,
and much, much more. Here we look at 5 resources just to give
you a flavour of what this amazing website has to offer.
Finding
relevant , reliable and engaging data to use in the classroom
can be an absolute nightmare. But with the Guardian Data Blog
you are guaranteed to find what you are looking for, and often
find something amazing that you were not looking for! See my
WebWhizz video here
Hundreds
of free, high quality maths and english resources for your interactive
whiteboard. Many of these are aimed at primary school students,
but can be used successfully with younger and lower ability
students at secondary school level. I am quite a big fan of
the Counting Fish and the shark who takes things away!
An
alternative to Gapminder World and Nation Master (see below).
Google offers lots of data sets and lots of different ways of
displaying them, including scatter diagrams and bar charts.
Ideal for making statistics lessons more relevant and engaging
With
Nationmaster you can very quickly and clearly make comparisons
between countries using thousands of interesting, up to date
statistics. Its ability to then dig out both positive and negative
correlations and direct you to related statistics make this
website, in my opinion, a must visit before teaching any data
handling topics. See my WebWhizz video here
There
are few search engines that can rival Google, but for a mathematician,
Wolfram Alpha certainly comes close. It is incredibly powerful
and incredibly fun too. Are Craigs more popular than Kates and
how often are people talking about mathematics? Wolfram Alpha
has the answer. See my WebWhizz video
here and check out my Wolfram Alpha
Widgets
One
of my all time favourite websites. This is how statistics should
be presented - so they are engaging, relevant and informative.
I have never seen a class of students getting so excited over
a series of moving dots before! I have done a range of videos
highlighting uses of Gapminder World here
The
importance of giving students a sense of the size of numbers
has long been shown in research to be a key factor in mathematical
development. This website is ideal for helping to promote that.
Each day students are given something to estimate. I do these
at the start of a lesson, and the discussions that follow shed
light into my students' thinking and also engage them in the
lesson.
Another
really good LEA website, jam packed full of great free resources.
They don't quite have as many tarsia jigsaw files as me, but
apart from that... :-)
The
TES has always been full of really good maths resources, created
by other teachers. The difference is now that the search facility
has been drastically improved, making this one of my first stops
when I am on the hunt for a fancy resource. If you look hard
enough you will find mysteries, collective memories, investigations,
and many other interesting resources on here. Also, I have spent
quite a lot of time assembling some if the best resources into
themed Collections
Pattern
recognition and generalisaing are key mathematical skills. This
site presents over 100 patterns for students to discuss. I use
them at the start of the lesson and ask students to describe
the pattern in words, predict how many would be in the 50th
pattern, and then (when they are ready) move onto the algebra
A
wonderful website for helping students develop skills in plotting
real life graphs. The videos are perfect hooks, and there is
a handy students website provided. My personal favourite is
the bench press!
Unlike
the main bulk of this site, this little section is free and
contains a ridiculously large collection of resources ready
to download. The only drawback is that each resource must by
downloaded individually and unzipped before use, but there is
some quality stuff on here, so it is well worth the effort.
Also, you must submit a resource yourself before you can download
- share and share alike!
A
brilliant set of exam questions for all the A Level modules,
including Further Maths, with step-by-step solutions provided.
Basically, it's what MathsNet used to do before you had to pay
for it. These make great starters on the IWB, and the website
is a good one to encourage your students to visit for revision.
The
best website around for information about famous (and not so
famous) mathematicians. I would also heartily recommend following
them on twitter at @MathsHistory, as you get sent a Mathematician
of the Day tweet every single day!
What
a brilliant website! Full of lesson ideas and resources, high
quailty and very well organised. The Investigations are absolutely
fantastic - well supported, rich, interesting tasks. Spot on!
A
brilliant website which has video clips and lesson plans for
what many maths teachers consider to be the Holy Grail... examples
of real life maths! The stuff on there already is very
good, and new content seems to be being added all the time.
Definitely worth a look!
A
website that hasn't been updated since 2007, but which still
contains lots of free resources which tend to be different from
the usual ones available on the web.
A
truly excellent website from AST, Mark Greenaway. Loads of stuff
on here from resources, revision guides, advice, links, and
pretty much anything else you could want. Very, very good.
One
of the most controversial maths website around (let's be honest,
there aren't many others). Thousands of videos taking students
step-by-step through how to solve lots of questions. It's not
for everybody, but it is certainly worth a look
A
truly amazing website which is easy to navigate and is jam-packed
full of free teaching resources. The interactive Excel files
in particular are very impressive. A must visit!
I
couldn't believe my eyes when I saw this. Pretty much the whole
of the AS course (and a lot of the A2 course) available in high
quality PowerPoint files... and all for free! Brilliant!
An
amazing website that keeps getting better! Crammed full of PowerPoint,
EasiTeach and Tarsia Jigsaw resources for all topics, and all
for free! The A Level section is one of the best around. Brilliant!
One
of the few websites I visit every day. Maths practitioners from
all over the world asking questions, sharing ideas and giving
answers (and the occasional rant). I have collected together
some of my favourite discussions here
The
NCETM have introduced a Documents tab, whereby maths teachers
can quickly and easily share resources. If this catches on it
good be one of the best places to go to swap and share top quality
resources.
A
nice website where you can find archives of interesting maths
lectures, which can either be downloaded as videos or audio
files, or if not then they can be streamed over the internet.
There is lots of good stuff here.
An
excellent website that is continually growing. It's jam packed
full of videos and other free resources, all set up by a very
generous maths teacher. Give it a look.
This
a blog written by the author of the wonderful Furbles
and Primitives software (see Essential
Freebies). The author is clearly a passionate mathematician,
and his thoughts and the internet gems that he regularly throws
up are well worth a look. A really nice website. NOTE: When
you click on the link it looks like the page "cannot be
found". Simply scroll down the page and you have access
to all the categories
A
brilliant website which offers lesson plans, complete with resources,
which are often a bit more interactive for the pupils than they
usually might be. The website is really well organised and there
is some truly excellent stuff on here.
A
really nice website full of original and fun maths games and
puzzles. This website is definitely one to watch with the promise
of more puzzles, starters and investigations to be added soon!
An
excellent website offering lots of really good (and free) teaching
resources and assessment material. The A Level section in particular
is simply outstanding.
I
really like this. Google collated data on every word in every
one of the books that they have on Google Books and allowed
you to display statisics on them. To get you started, try compaing
the use of "garlic" and "onion" over time...
A
simply brilliant website which has recently had an impressive
makeover. Not only are there bucket loads of resources (all
for free, of course), but also there is lots of advice for teachers,
as well as interactive schemes of work and good website links,
and that's just the teacher section! Very good.
I
was slow to pick up on this website, but now I am a convert!
For teaching A Level Maths, this website is simply brilliant.
Pick the topic y from the menu on the left, and then watch all
the resources appear. What I like best of all is the variety
of resources, from nice little leaflets covering all the main
facts, the video tutorials. Brilliant!
A
really nice idea. The authors have got together the 8 maths
topics they consider to contain the biggest misconceptions in
pupils (and they promise another 16 soon!), and they offer examples,
advice, and exercises on how to correct them. Very good!
It's
hard to know where to start with this website, because there
is just so much good stuff on it. I have linked you straight
to the home page, and I would suggest you scroll down and have
a look at the CIMT Resources section. There are free notes,
exercises for the pupils to do, puzzles, competitions, and real
world applications of maths. If you've got a spare twenty minutes,
have a good look around.
A
specific link to a document on the excellent Suffolk Maths website.
If you are planning a Maths Day at your school, no matter how
big or small, then this might just come in handy
An
amazing website with starters, assignments, skills activities
and web links for lots of topics. The Statistics
and the Decision Maths sections
in particular are extremely impressive for teaching older students,
but there is also loads of good stuff on money and shape for
the younger ones.
The
number one website if you are teaching further maths. Some of
the stuff you have to pay for, but there are plenty of excellent
free resources on there as well.
A
fantastic website set up by Cambridge University. If you haven't
visited it for a while, give it ago. Not only are there loads
and loads of really good puzzles and activities (all organised
into age groups and difficulty, with complete solutions), but
there are also curriculum
mapping documents which show how all these puzzles and activities
fit into the national framework to spice up the dullest of topics.
Not only this, but there are some really good articles aimed
specifically at teachers, some offering advice, others giving
exciting angles into topics. Brilliant!
I
really like this site. Lots of mistakes made by real students,
which can form the basis of a useful discussion of a topic,
and hopefully ensure your students don't make the same mistakes
This
is something a little different. Schools can sign up to the
website for free and create a Maths Community for their maths
department. Teachers can then upload content to their schools
page, such as class notes, homework documents and important
messages. Students can log on to the "Student Zone",
where they can view the uploaded documents, and post questions
of their own, which can be answered by their teacher or other
members of the Maths-Quarter community. A nice idea if your
maths department does not have their own web-page, and the potential
for per-to-peer learning looks promising.
A
really nice website, jam-packed full of top quality resources.
There are PowerPoints, GSP files, and lots of those Tarsia Jigsaws
that I just can't do without. Definitely worth a visit!
Douglas
Butler's amazing website with links to just aobut every brilliant
website in the world. You could quite easily spend a day looking
through this. The For
the Busy Teacher section is particuarly impressive
An
excellent example of maths teachers sharing outstanding resources.
Probing questions, investigations, assessment material, the
works! There is some really excellent stuff on here, and it
is updated on a regular basis, so make sure you keep going back
to check.
Something
a bit different here. It is an encyclopedia cataloging well
over 100,000 integer sequences. Sounds boring?... surely not...
but what I like about it is not only is every sequence discussed
and links provided, there is also the option to graph each sequence,
and hear the sound of the terms played on a piano. My top recommendation
is Recaman's
Sequence, which is so simple to construct, but so difficult
to explain!
A
nice website run by an enthusiastic teacher. There are lots
of links for pupils and teachers to free resources and other
good websites, and some of the site's original resources for
teachers are excellent.
A
nice website which attempts (and almost succeeds) to answer
the eternal question: “sir, what use is this in real life?”.
Also provides information on careers involving maths and really
good links to newspaper articles and other resources.
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