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1.
NRICH
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It
is so much more than a website of puzzles. The Curriculum
Mapping documents, breadth of topics covered, and teacher
support make this website simply indispensable |
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2.
UKMT
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It's
the home of the fantastic Maths Challenges and also one of
the first places I visit if I want some rich, challenging
problems for students of all ages and abilities. And what
about the twist they put on Fizz Buzz?... classic! |
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3.
Guardian Data Blog
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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! |
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4.
Wolfram Alpha
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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. |
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5.
Maths Faculty
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I
am always a big fan of websites set up by teachers or maths
departments, as they are the ones who know what teachers are
after. This fantastic website provides PowerPoints, worksheets
and homeworks for pretty much every Key Stage 3 and 4 topic,
which makes it an essential place to visit on my way to planning
lessons. |
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6.
NLVM
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The
National Library of Visual Manipulatives is a fantastic website
crammed full of really impressive little applets. These applets
provide interesting and innovative ways for visualising some
of the most important concepts in maths. I am a particular
fan of the congruent triangles resource and the balance beam
for solving linear equations. A lovely website that is certainly
worth a visit. |
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7.
Cleave Books Calculators
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Something
a bit different this week - a really interesting set of online
“calculators” from Cleave Books. Now, these are
not your standard calculators. Oh no, these allow you and
your students to calculate everything you could possibly want
to know about 2D and 3D shapes, as well as everything from
the Cost of Living to units of alcohol. This lends itself
nicely to some rich challenging questions to pose to your
students. |
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8.
Colleen Young's Maths Blog
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This
is one of my “must visit on a regular basis” websites.
It is a blog set up by a very enthusiastic and talented teacher
that certainly keeps me up to date on the latest exciting
developments in maths teaching and technology. There are gems
such as online interactive whiteboards and collections of
amazing rich tasks. If you subscribe to the website (for free!)
you get a lovely email telling you each time a new post has
been added. A brilliant website. |
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9.
Khan Academy
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A
controversial one this week as it’s the turn of Khan
Academy. This is a website with over 2,600 videos of lessons
and worked examples, many of them relating the mathematics.
The questions are: do you like them, and if so how can the
videos be used effectively for learning? I suggest that maybe
some sort of “reverse learning” could be employed,
or better still why not record your own video? |
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10.
Mr Reddy's Geometry Tool Box
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Mr
Reddy’s Geometry Toolbox is an absolutely essential
tool when I am trying to teach students about measuring and
constructing. Whether it’s drawing line of 7cm, measuring
an angle of 40 degrees, or trying to use a compass, you can
guarantee that mistakes will be made. But with the ability
to carry out very clear demonstrations thanks to Mr Reddy,
you might just get through these lessons with some of your
hair left in place. |
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11.
Google Ngram Viewer
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Google
can always be relied upon to come up with the goods, and this
little website is no exception. Google have taken all of the
5.2million books that they have access to from the last 200
years, analysed all 500 billion words of them, and made it
possible to search for the relative frequency of any of the
words within them. So, how does garlic compare to onion over
the last couple of centuries? How about radio, television
and the internet? Lots of fun with numbers and graphs to be
had here. |
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12.
MathsFlash
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I
am always on the look-out for short, snappy activities that
are related to things going on in the real world to hammer
home the relevance of maths to my students. Well, for that
aim this amazing website is simply a Godsend. Each day new
activities appear based around current news stories. Whether
it be tennis, the new host of Countdown or the destruction
of the Brazilian Rainforest, you can be sure that MathsFlash
has a starter activity lined up for you. Enjoy. |
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13.
NRICH Advent Calendar
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We
return to the NRICH website to have a look at their annual
offering of an advent calendar. But this is not your usual
advent calendar because behind each door instead of a chocolate
treat you will find… a mathematical treat! One lovely
problem for each of the days leading up to Christmas. NRICH
produces the goods once again. Ho, ho, ho! |
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14.
Xmas Special
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It’s
that time of the year where you may be tempted to throw a
little bit of a… sharp intake of breath… “fun
lesson” into the mix, and in my opinion there is no
better fun lesson that one involving a quiz. Here are a few
ideas and resources to help you put together an award-winning
Christmas Quiz that might just make those last few lessons
pass a little quicker. Merry Christmas and I will return with
more videos in the new year. |
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15.
Nation Master
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Anyone
who knows me or has watched my videos will know I am slightly
obsessed with Statistics. My teaching of statistics has been
revolutionised by Gapminder World
and Guardian Data Blog, and now here comes another absolutely
fantastic statistical website. 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. |
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16.
Number Loving Blog
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If
one amazing mathematics blog wasn’t enough for you,
well how about two! Following on from Colleen Young’s
excellent blog (see Video 8) we now have Number Loving. This
blog is simply rammed packed full of the latest mathematical
news and developments. There are loads of free resources and
lots of great ideas that the authors have kindly shared, all
for free. It is definitely worth signing up to. Thank you
Sharon and Laura! |
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17.
Murderous Maths
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This
week it is the turn of the Murderous Maths Website, which
is the online home of the excellent Murderous Maths series
of books. Just like the books, this site is absolutely crammed
packed full of fascinating maths tricks, features and activities.
I pick out a couple of my favourites, and also suggest a way
that this website could be used for an interesting maths project
with your pupils. |
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18.
iTunes U and QED
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iTunes
U is a feature of Apple’s iTunes service where universities
and education providers from all over the world have uploaded
complete courses, with videos, notes, homeworks, on a whole
variety of subjects, all completely free. Mathematics is really
well represented. Here we take a look at a Statistics course
from Harvard, and then at an excellent series of puzzles from
Cambridge called Quite Easily Done (QED). This is a fantastic
resource with potential to help both teachers and students. |
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19.
Maths History
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Mathematics
has one of the richest, most interesting histories of all
the subjects, full of sparks of genius and shady goings on,
and yet this is largely something that students are ignorant
of. The wonderful Mac Tutor History of Mathematics website
can rectify all of this, providing a comprehensive catalogues
of all the big (and not so big) names in Mathematics. And
what’s more, they even have a Twitter feed so you can
get updated with the Mathematician of the Day every day of
the year! |
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20.
Count On
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An
oldie but a goodie here! Count On used to be one of my most
visited websites in my early years of teaching. It has been
a while since it was last updated, but that doesn’t
mean there isn’t excellent stuff on here. We take a
quick look at some of the games before focussing our attention
on an excellent analysis of common mathematical misconceptions
which could be sued a stimulus for departmental meetings. |
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21.
Maths Blogs (the best of!)
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My
number one source for keeping up to date with all the latest
developments in maths resources and ideas are blogs. A load
of them have sprung up over the last twelve months, and their
quality is absolutely unbelievable. In this video we take
a quick look at some of my favourites, including posts about
flipped classrooms, thoughts and crosses, teaching crushes,
World Maths Day and so much more. And can I personally say
a massive thank you to all the kind, talented, dedicated and
generous people who run them. |
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22.
Get the Math!
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Two
issues that I regularly face in my teaching are: 1) trying
to think of relevant, engaging activities to hook the students
in and 2) making effective use of any computer room lessons
I am lucky enough to secure. The Get the Math website might
just solve both of these problems. It contains three detailed,
rich, engaging, interactive activities about how mathematics
is used in the real world. The one we look at in details concerns
two hip-hop artists whose drum-beat and sample are not in
time. What maths is needed to sort the mix out? This is a
really high-quality website. |
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23.
Mathematical Magic
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Magic
is one of the few things that fascinates all students, regardless
of age and ability. Mathematics (of course) is the most important
subject in the world. Therefore, if you can bring these two
great subjects together, wonderful things will ensue. This
free manual of mathematical magic is packed to the brim with
amazing magical tricks, all of which have a fundamental mathematical
basis. In this video we look at some of the tricks, and think
more widely about how they might be used in the classroom.
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24.
Numberphile
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Numberphile
is an amazing collection of quirky, interesting and inspirational
mathematical videos. The topics covered are wide ranging to
say the least, from the wonders of 1729, to birthdays, Googolplex
and e. Here we take a look at a few of the videos and then
talk about possible uses of the videos in the classroom, both
to end a lesson in style or as the basis of a rich, practical
project for students. |
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25.
My Life in Numbers
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Data
and Statistics are still burdened with the unfortunate reputation
of being rather dull topics in maths. This I highly unfair,
and there are few more important and relevant mathematical
topics to the lives of students and the word around them.
Previously in this Web Whizz Video series we have looked at
the outstanding Gapminder World, Wolfram Alpha and Guardian
Data Blog, which can help bring statistics to life, and My
Life in Numbers deserves to sit alongside those. Just wait
until you see your students’ reaction to the number
of heartbeats Justin Bieber has had, and how David Beckham’s
earnings tick by quicker than the passing seconds. Excellent
stuff |
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26.
Number Loving
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In
Web Whizz Video 16 we looked at the outstanding Number Loving
Blog. Well, not content with conquering the world of blogging,
Sharon and Laura have put together an accompanying resources
website, and what a website it is! 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. |
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27.
Median by Don Steward
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In
recent weeks I don’t mind confessing that I have become
more than a little obsessed with Don Steward’s outstanding
Median Blog. The quality and variety of the resources on offer
is simply world class. I absolutely adore the almost random
nature of the resources produced. In this video we need look
no further than the first page to find top quality resources
on a whole host of topics. |
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28.
Autograph Player Activities
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I
know, I know, guilty as charged! This week’s Web Whizz
video features my website. However, hopefully you will forgive
me when you see the brand new and completely free Autograph
Player activities that are now available. Unlike Autograph
files, these activities do not need the software installed,
which means you can use them completely freely to demonstrate
topics in class, or set them as homework assignments for your
students. Here we look at activities about transformations,
angles, circle theorem, battleships and scatter diagrams. |
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29.
A+ Click Math
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I
have made no secret about what a massive fan of the NRICH
website I am, and whilst it remains my number one stop for
rich maths puzzles and problems, this website might just be
number two. There are literally hundreds of puzzle and problems
for students to solve. They are beautifully laid out on the
page, making them absolutely ideal to project on the board
to use as starter activities or extension work. I also suggest
using them in the computer room as the website keeps a handy
record of students’ progress through a series of puzzles.
With the development of students creative thinking and problem
solving only growing in importance, this website is a must
visit! |
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30.
TES Topic Specials
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Over
the last couple of months I have asked my TES
Maths Panel to compile a series of Topic Specials on the
major area of maths teaching. They were challenged to find
10 outstanding resources from the thousands freely available
on TES to assemble into themed collections. These collections
are now live on the website, and they are simply phenomenal.
The range and quality of the resources kindly shared by TES
users always amazes me, and these collections should help
you dive straight in to the very best that TES has to offer.
Thank you to the Panel for all their hard work! |
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31.
101 Questions
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As
a teacher, I am obsessed by questions. The best questions
are those that get the students thinking and ignite their
interests. This website, created by Dan Meyer, is all about
interesting questions. When you visit the website you are
presented with an image and asked to write down the first
question that comes to mind. You can then access a whole back
catalogue of images and questions on everything from gumball
machines to dominoes. These provide outstanding stimuli for
lessons, and highlight the practical and many varied uses
of mathematics. |
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32.
Census at School
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Census
at School provides a gold mine full of rich, interesting,
relevant data that can spice up any statistics based lessons.
Don’t worry if you haven’t had chance to register
your students, you can still access ten years’ worth
of questionnaires and data. In this video we take a look at
how you can easily grab a sample of 100 students’ responses
to the question: what superpower would you most desire? This
can then be instantly changed into a pie chart, bar chart
or whatever you want to compare to your own students results.
Amazing stuff! |
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