WAGOLL

February 21, 2014, 6:05 am

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Earlier this year I saw the following tweet from @thththalia...

What I loved about this was the WAGOLL...'What a good one looks like'. I'd never seen/heard of this before, but thought that I could use it when giving feedback to my GCSE classes after they had completed a past paper/assessment.

I tried it out initially with my Y10 set 1 class at the end of last month.





Now, when I was setting up their feedback lesson I thought about writing 'examplar' answers to the questions they had in their past paper assessment. However, what I liked about the tweet above was that the WAGOLL had come from the students themselves. So, taking this into account I thought it'd be better if it was the students answers I used to show the class WAGOLL.

Having looked at my spreadsheet where I brake down the marks for each student by question, I picked out those students who had achieved full marks on each of the 1st 10 questions on the paper (I wanted to focus the class on being able to pick up full marks on the 1st half of the paper in order for them to achieve the highest grades possible).

Here's my breakdown spreadsheet (names removed obviously)...

As you can see I work out the average mark per question for the class and have worked out the modal mark for each question too.

Next, I took pictures of those students answers where they had scored full marks and set up a presentation to go through in class.

Here's the opening slide that I had on the IWB as they entered...

As the class entered I only had the title and the 'WAGOLL' shown and the rest of the slide was hidden by the SMARTnotebook blind. They were all trying to figure out what 'WAGOLL' meant as it was the first time they had seen it.

I then handed out their papers and gave them time to look through their questions, ask any questions, find out what their friends had got etc. Then, I revealed what WAGOLL meant and gave them the snapshot figures for the class.

I then explained we were going to go through the 1st few questions on the paper and that I had photographed some of their work to show examples of 'What A Good One Looks Like'.

For each question I had a slide, like below, where I gave brief info on the question, marks allowed, the class' average (mean) mark and modal mark and then a picture of one of their answers. Here's an example...

The reaction from the class as we were going through the answers to each question was far better than when I had tried to go through questions with them in the past using the exam paper and writing the answers on the board. The reasons being, I think, were that:

• The answers had come from the students themselves - some of them revelled in the fact that their answer had been chosen to show the class how to get full marks on that question.
• I discussed, for each question, why the person had achieved full marks and where they picked up each mark. This, when students had their papers to compare the WAGOLL answer with their answer allowed them to see clearly why they didn't get full marks and what they needed to do to get the extra mark/s.
• I added in a few practice questions after certain questions that were answered poorly by the majority of the class to break down going through question after question. I gave them time to complete the questions, we went through the answers and checked understanding and then moved onto the next question.

I have now set up the same feedback lessons for both my Y11 classes next week when returning to school. I will hope to see the same engagement from them as I did from my Y10 class. I will focus on the improvement the classes have made too from their mock examinations and give them an idea of where we were (mock grades), where we are now (current exam grades), where we need to be (target grades). All of this should help refocus the students back into their learning (after half term) and motivate them further to be revising for their GCSE examinations NOW!

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What's Your Favourite Button on a Calculator?

February 22, 2014, 10:15 am

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On Monday, when we return to school after a relaxing half-term, I will be starting a mentoring 'role' with one of the ITTs my school are taking on for the next 10 weeks. Now, this was something I wanted to do at the start of this year, but as I do not yet have the required amount of experience for the ITT provider in our area it is something I had resigned to next school year when I am capable of undergoing the training officially. However, the week before half-term we received a phone call to say that we would be getting 2 ITTs after half-term and not just one as we had previously thought. So, I have been asked to support our department's ITT mentor with the mentoring role to our 2 ITTs. He will be the official mentor to our 2 ITTs, but I will be supporting him by holding meetings, observing lessons, and just being there for advice etc. So, in effect, I am an 'additional mentor', if you like, in an unofficial capacity.

Over the past week I have been getting my classes ready for when the ITTs take them over and so have been getting their class folders all up-to-date, marking their books, sorting out the schemes of work etc so they've got as much information as they could need when teaching the classes. As I have been doing this I got thinking about my own mentor on my GTP and how we held our meetings, how the observations went, what he said to me in feedback sessions and in general what and how he taught me.
Of the MANY, MANY things I was taught that year, my mentor once asked me what my favourite button on the calculator was. Now, this was something I had never thought of before and so I was intrigued as to what his was. My mentor's favourite button on the calculator is this little beauty...

The sexagesimal to decimal button!


As such it has since become my favourite too. The button, for those of you who don't know what it is/how it works, allows you to convert between sexagesimal and decimal values. So, when working with time calculations, or with degrees, you can use the button to convert a decimal to hours, minutes and seconds.

For example, if you were working out the time it took to run 12 miles at 8mph you would get an answer of 1.5 (hours). Then, by pressing the sexagesimal to decimal button, you get an answer of 1hr and 30 minutes. This answer is separated by the open circle, apostrophe and speech marks where 0 is given for the number of seconds.
You can also convert the other way. So if you wanted to know what 1 hour and 48 minutes was as a decimal you would type in 1, press the button above, 4, 8, the button above and then equals to get this displayed in sexagesimal form, then just press the button again to display it as a decimal (1.8 hours).

Prior to writing this post I looked up the online manual for my Casio calculator (others are, of course, available) and have since found lots of other things that can be done with the button, including adding and subtracting times:

For example, if you press...
1, button, 5, 2, button, +, 1, button, 2, 5, button, = ( 1 hour 52 mins + 1 hour 25 mins)
you will get an answer of...
3, open circle, 17, apostrophe, 0, speech mark (3 hours, 17 minutes, 0 seconds)!

There are lots more examples in the manual/appendix below!

These files can be found here...
http://support.casio.com/pdf/004/fx-82ES_etc_E.pdf
and
http://support.casio.com/pdf/004/fx82ES_350ESetc._Appendix.pdf

There is usually a question on the GCSE papers that require students to work with some sort of time calculation. Whether it be a simple speed, distance, time calculation or a trickier question where a question is given in context that they have to work out.
When marking papers I have seen students write answers incorrectly when they do not realise that the decimal answers they get when working out time calculations do not correspond to the time in hours, minutes and seconds. A common misconception I have seen is when students write 1.25 hours as 1 hour and 25 minutes and not, as it should be, 1 hour and 15 minutes.

I know I wasn't taught how to use the sexagesimal to decimal button when I was at school and wonder what difference it would make to students if they were able to use the button correctly. Obviously, there is a need for students to know how to convert between hours, minutes and seconds etc, but if they are given the use of a calculator in an examination then that's what it is there for!

I know that my students need to become a lot more familiar with how to use their calculators, when working with trigonometry, geometry, fractions, powers, roots etc. It frustrates me so much when students can't even convert between a fractional answer and a decimal answer; I often get asked 'Sir, how do I get rid of this fraction' or 'Sir, I'm not getting what you've got on the board' (wrong setting [radians/degrees etc]).

So...I think this half-term I will set them a homework to explore one of the buttons on their calculator in greater detail. Get them to produce a poster about their chosen button with worked examples and diagrams of how they can/could use the button in their examinations.

My question to you then is this...What's your favourite button on a Calculator?!

Tweet me @mrprcollins or comment below...

Y11 Higher Homework Sheets

February 22, 2014, 10:53 am

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Prior to starting at my school in September last year I was asked by my HoD to find/produce some homework sheets aimed at the higher tier students in Y11.
Now, there are plenty of these type of revision sheets available on the TES, but I wanted to set up my own to cover certain topics I feel are important to achieve certain grades and have some sheets that would be both non-calculator and calculator.

So, I initially set up some grade C-B sheets to give to our higher tier Y11 students. The aim here was that they would be given a sheet a week and the sheets alternated between non-calculator homeworks and calculator homeworks. The odd numbered sheets therefore became non-calc and the even numbers calc h/ws. The other aim with these sheets was that they would re-jog the memories of students who may have forgotten certain topics they had learnt last year and would allow them to keep these C/B grade topics fresh in their minds as they learnt the higher graded topics in class.

To access the sheets click this link ---> http://www.tes.co.uk/teaching-resource/Y11-Higher-C-B-Grade-Homework-Sheets-6353581/ (where you can download them from my TES resources). All answers included!

The sheets get slightly harder as they progress and I have seen this reflected in the marks my students achieved on the sheets as the weeks progressed. So, it was difficult to see if progression was being made as the questions were getting harder as the sheet numbers increased. However, for the top end students the marks did not fluctuate much.

I gave these sheets to both my top set Y11 class and my 3rd set class (D/C borderline). I found that the 3rd set class struggled with the sheets somewhat and that some of the topics they had not been taught before. So, in order to support them, I started to create videos that I uploaded to my YouTube Channel (mrcollinsmaths). I have now created a 'tutorial' video for each of the topics that appear on the non-calc (odd numbered) sheets. On these videos I go through the topic, briefly, and then give students example questions to attempt before revealing the answers. The hope then being that they'll be able to then complete the questions on the sheet or come and seek further explanation form me in our after-school revision sessions. I will do the same for the calculator topics when I find more time!

You can see all the 20 non-calc tutorial videos by clicking on the below link where a playlist of the 20 topics/vids will start playing...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9HHyNAhdMo&list=PLyg5ecqzmzXtDuDFfQ-HrTeeUsksc6joa

I am still using these sheets with my set 3 Y11 class, however my top set Y11 are now progressing to a point where I'm hoping they'll all be able to get As/A*s. So, this week, I set up another document with homework sheets for my top set class to be given each week leading up to their GCSEs. These homeworks focus mainly on A and A* topics with a few trickier B grade topics they've struggled with in past papers etc.

The topics covered on these sheets are:
Surds, Bounds, Indices, Direct and Inverse Proportion, Algebraic Fractions, Standard Form, Simultaneous Equations (linear and quadratic/circle), Probability (without replacement), Factorising where the coefficient of the x squared term is greater than 1 and Recurring Decimals.

You can download these sheets from my TES resources by going to:

http://www.tes.co.uk/teaching-resource/Y11-Homework-Sheets-B-A-Grade-6406880/
I haven't got round to doing the answers for these yet, but will upload the answers file to the resource when I have done them.

I hope these sheets are useful to others as they have been to me and my students. Let me know if you use them/have any suggestions for improvements etc.

N.B. I wanted to include other topics but due to needing diagrams or charts etc I decided to keep the majority of topics to number and algebra and so there's not too much shape, space and measure or data handling here.

'alexpett's' GCSE Maths Topic Log

March 2, 2014, 3:17 pm

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Just after the New Year I came across one of the best resources I have seen uploaded to the TES website. The resource is 'alexpett's''Maths Topic Log' which can be seen and downloaded here...

http://www.tes.co.uk/teaching-resource/Maths-Topic-Log-6372049/

The resource is an EPIC one that I have been using with my 3rd set Y11 class since we returned to school in the New Year. The reason I have been using this resource with them is that following their mock results, where only a couple of students in the class achieved a C grade or above, I decided I needed to focus on the 'borderline' topics with them in order for them ALL to achieve Cs and above. This, I believe, was better for them than trying to teach them the higher topics where they may be able to pick up a few marks here and there. So, essentially (for now) I am putting the topics that appear at the back of the Higher Tier exam papers (A-A* topics) to one side, and focusing on the 'borderline' topics to ensure students can answer ALL of the questions in the 1st half of the paper...at least. This will allow them to get a C grade, if not a B grade, which would allow all the students in my class to hit their targets as none of them are above a grade B. Then, nearer their examinations, and through after-school revision sessions, I can cover the harder topics.

The resource, a formatted spreadsheet with over 40 topics (with included worksheets (tests) all hyperlinked from it), has therefore become the basis of our lessons since the start of term 2. In each of our lessons we start out by 'mindmapping' the topic we are studying, drawing on prior knowledge and covering misconceptions, or, the class are given a series of questions to attempt on the topic. I then go through the questions with the class and cover anything they hadn't covered before. On some occasions I have had to teach the topic 'fresh' as nothing has been forthcoming in the start of the lesson, in which case we sometimes have then to spread the topic over a series of lessons. After the starter, and input from myself, the class are then given the 'Test A' and 'Test B' for that lesson's topic. They work through the questions, some with support from my teaching assistants and I, and then we go through the answers together on the IWB and the class mark their work. I then take all their work in and update the spreadsheet to track how they are doing. In some of our lessons we only get time to do 'Test A', so 'Test B' is given as homework due in in our next lesson.

Here's how my current spreadsheet looks...

Obviously, I have taken my students' names out. As you can see from the xls each student's score is colour coded depending on how successful they were with each topic's test. There are also averages for each of the 4 areas of Mathematics.
There are a few 'gaps' as some students are out of some of our lessons due to college. Some 'Test Bs' are blank to due to h/w not being completed (sanctions applied accordingly!)

My class, since the start of term 2, have covered all of the 'number' and 'algebra' topics, including 2 or 3 of the 'shape, space and measure' and 'data handling' topics where I thought they fitted in well with the topics we had covered previously. So, with about 8 weeks left of teaching my Y11s we have the majority of the shape, space and measure topics and the data handling topics. Now, as we have had assessments in class since we started going through the topics on the resource, I have taken certain topics out that the class did well on as a whole as we would not have time otherwise to go through each topic on the resource. I also took out those topics we had already covered in the 1st term.

What I aim to do with the data is as follows...

On the other 'tab' at the bottom of the xls there is a worksheet where you can pull out individual student's results on each topic's tests. When the class start their examinations, and therefore do not come to school except when they have examinations, I will give each of them a breakdown of their results, which will help form the basis of their revision for their examinations in June.

Here's what the sheet looks like that I'll be giving each student...

You can see the topics this student has covered, and where there are gaps. These 'gaps' will be the lessons they missed through absence/college and so will need looking up/attempting. I have put all of the 'tests' on the school's VLE so all students can already access them at home (I have had some [a few] come back from students that missed the lesson on that topic, but took the initiative to do them at home to catch up).

I will advise students as to which topics are the ones they should focus on (especially if there are a few 'redish' ones). For this student they'd need to look up their knowledge of indices, FDP and probably standard form too.

What I love about the resource (the spreadsheet and the hyperlinked worksheets) is that my students have really taken to our lessons this term. I was worried that they would get 'bored' with our lessons, but they have liked the consistency and format of them. They know what they are going to be doing in each lesson and more importantly, what is expected of them - they know they will need to copy notes/examples from the board in the initial part of the lesson and that they will have to complete both tests in the lesson (or complete for h/w [something they'll do as much as they can to avoid]).

Here's what the 'tests' look like (these are the 'angles in polygons' sheets I will be covering with my class tomorrow)...

 

Each 'test' is out of 10 marks and look very similar to the questions the students will be asked to answer in their examinations. This is important as when we go over the answers in class I take the students through where they get each of the marks and what the examiners will be looking for in certain cases. It also allows me to go over the 'examination terminology' with the words like 'explain', 'justify', 'solve', 'simplify' etc and what they actually mean for the students.

I can only speak highly of the resource above and recommend it to anyone that teaches a 'borderline' GCSE group. As 'alexpett' states in the description of his resource, it is a 'work in progress', which must only mean there is even more to come from it.

I recently did an assessment in class with my 3rd set (we gave them a non-calculator, linear, higher past paper). Over half of the class are now on a C grade or above and this must be down, in part at least, to the use of this resource in our lessons since the start of term 2.

So, THANK YOU VERY MUCH 'alexpett'!

mymaths and magicwhiteboard

April 7, 2014, 8:29 am

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Earlier this term, I was revising the different types of transformations with my Y11 set 3 class as this was one of the topics that was flagged up from their mock examinations. After we had done a couple of lessons on the topic we had our fortnightly computer room lesson (each class gets one of these a fortnight). So, as my school predominantly uses www.mymaths.co.uk for these lessons, I went about the normal setting of the tasks and was all ready for their lesson.

However, it soon became apparent that the transformations tasks on mymaths require more than just typing an answer into a box and isn't naturally a great topic to do online; students are used to using tracing paper to perform the different transformations and I had taught them, for example, (for enlargements) to use projection lines to find the centre of enlargement, which they obviously couldn't do on screen.

So, as we were already, at this point, in the ICT room and the whole class were logged on and attempting the tasks, I needed a solution. Some of the students had intuitively started to get the mini whiteboards out and were reproducing the questions on their boards to then work on. However, this seemed like a bit of a waste of time. Cue me remembering my www.magicwhiteboard.co.uk sheets!

I asked my teaching assistant to go and get these out of my 'magic whiteboards' draw so that the students could use them as tracing paper over the computer screens. I asked her to get the A4 magic whiteboards as these would be big enough to go over the screens (we had previously used the 'magic sticky notes' in class when doing rotations, translations etc).
When the teaching assistant returned, I showed a few of the students, who had initially asked how they were going to do the transformations on screen, what to do with the magic whiteboard sheets.

It wasn't long until the whole class had a sheet and whiteboard pen. After a brief demo at the front of the class the rest were working on their tasks. Here's what this looked like...

Using the magic whiteboards allowed my class to get on with the task where they otherwise would not have done so well.

Apart from one of the school's SLT coming in and almost having a heart attack when they seemingly saw my students drawing over the computer screens, the lesson continued as normal and plenty of revising was done.

N.B. NO SLT WERE HARMED IN THE DELIVERY OF THIS LESSON!

Jumbo Calculators & IWB Calculators...

April 7, 2014, 9:15 am

≫ Next: Y11 - The Final Countdown

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Earlier this term I purchased myself a 'jumbo' calculator; an A4 sized calculator. I used to have one of these at one of my previous schools and they're great for being able to show students the buttons to press on the calculator to perform certain calculations. This works especially well with low-ability KS3 classes. The kids love the calculator too and ask to use it on a regular basis!

I got my one from www.amazon.co.uk and it is similar to the one pictured/linked below...

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Topwrite-Jumbo-Digit-Calculator-Green/dp/B0051OHNDW/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1396884867&sr=8-3&keywords=jumbo+calculator










However, the only downside to the large calculator (there is only one) is that it is not a scientific one and I am yet to find a jumbo sized scientific one (answers on a postcard/tweet/comment please)!

So, it was by luck that I found a solution to this problem this term. The solution came in the guise of one of my department's ITT students who had a Casio calculator that could be used on the IWB! How this is wonderfully possible is that the Casio people have created emulator software that allows you to do on screen to a calculator you'd have bought. This was exactly what I was looking for as so many higher tier students need to be shown, properly, how to use their scientific calculators when performing trig calculations, roots, powers etc etc.

So, I got myself one of these and have loved using it ever since. It now has a permanent home on my desktop at school and I can quickly call the calculator up whenever needed to show my students exactly what they'll need to press on their calculators to perform the calculations required. This has really helped my teaching of trigonometry this term to my top set Y11s when revising 'basic trig' (SOHCAHTOA), the sine and cosine rule and the area of any triangle using 1/2absinC.

I have found in the past that students often type in calculations incorrectly on their calculators assuming that the calculator is doing exactly what they need. For example...

 With this question, where you're asked to work out the length of (in this case) the opposite side. Students would need to do sine of the given angle multiplied by the length of the hypotenuse. So, naturally the kids type in sin, 3, 0, x, 1, 0, =. However, as you can see from my emulator calculator this would work out sine of 300, not sine 30, then multiplied by 10. The student needs to close the bracket on the automatically opened bracket.

This then allows me to show the students, and discuss with them, why this is wrong much, much easier than it would be to 'talk' them through it. I can then show on the IWB what they need to type in.






There have been so many good discussions that have come from me using the emulator on my IWB and going through examples with my students. I've had a lot of 'what does that button do, sir?' type questions that allow me to then show them things they can do with their calculators that they didn't previously know, all in an attempt to make it easier for them to pick up marks in their examinations and avoid losing marks through incorrect assumptions on what is being 'done' on their calculators. One of my favourite recent discussions was on the 'sexagesimal to decimal' button, see http://goo.gl/YVtEwy for more info!

You can look into the Casio emulators by clicking on the link below. I'm sure there are others available, but as my students, on the whole, have Casio calculators, I've chosen this one as it's the same as they have in their school bag/hand!

http://www.casio.co.uk/education/products/calculators/emulator-software/

Y11 - The Final Countdown

April 8, 2014, 6:03 am

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It's getting nearer to that point in the year where all the Y11s will be sitting their GCSE examinations and the final push for these will be well under way when we go back after the Easter holidays. Given the very short half term after the Easter holidays (ours is only 4 and a bit weeks), the fact their other GCSE examinations will have started and all that time off over Easter where I have no idea how much/little Mathematics revision they'll be doing I decided, earlier this term, that I needed to do everything I could to make sure they were aware of exactly how little time they have left before their Mathematics examinations.

So, just under 100 days before their 1st GCSE Mathematics examination (we do the Edexcel Linear [1MAO] spec) I put up the following display on the back of my classroom door. Each day, having double checked with my 'DaysUntil' app, I change the number of days left until their 1st Mathematics GCSE examination. This display is all aimed at making them aware of how much (or little) time they have left. In the majority of our lessons it has been referred to and it's strange how much impact it is having on some of my students. For example, I often here a lot of 'Ooo, we've only got 74 days left' or 'te he he, 69 days left' (a popular day)!

My tutor group are very good at reminding me to change the post-its each morning and they themselves (more than some of my Y11 students, perhaps) are aware of how long their older peers have left.

For each of my Y11 classes, in their last lesson before we broke up for Easter, I gave them the 'spiel' about how the number on the back of the door will be greatly depleted by the time we get back after the Easter holidays. I also reminded them that the number included the entire Easter holidays, the May half term and every weekend between now and their 1st examination (highlighting the lack of 'lesson time' we have remaining).

I tried to get them to see that they HAD to be doing some Mathematics revision/work over the Easter holidays so they do not drop down from their current, what I called, 'Mathematical State' and that if they did nothing they'd have to build themselves back up after the Easter holidays just to get back to the level that they left off on.

In order to help them all I have given them each, based on their preferences, a pack of grade targeted revision packs that I got from the brilliant @MathsAlex who has been tweeting these out over the past month or so. To see all of these papers, the front sheet for each grade and the mark schemes for the questions included, click on the following link --> https://t.co/iCpombGR8S.
I have also put all the papers on our school's VLE so the students can download other grades once they have finished with the one I printed and handed out to them.

By giving them these packs I hope they will have no excuses to not to be doing some sort of work/revision over the Easter holidays! They've also got my YouTube Channel https://www.youtube.com/user/mrcollinsmaths and mymaths etc etc.

I will also, over the next couple of weeks, be putting up a new display in my classroom all targeted towards their revision - useful websites, reminders of revision sessions, key info etc etc.

In addition, when we get back, I intend on showing them the below video by @Actionjackson. I saw this last year and it was shown to all my previous school's Y11s in a mock exam feedback session in the school's hall. This year, when the time is right, I will show it to each of my classes as I feel it is exactly what some of them will need! Thanks @Actionjackson for creating this, and your other videos.

If the video above does not load click on this link --> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMNGzUm0170

So, the clock is well and truly ticking for our Y11s. There are still a few topics I have to teach my top set Y11s, then it'll be straight through to revision, in and around the time they will spend out, in other examinations, which start the 2nd full week back I believe. For my Y11 3rd set, we'll be going through some of the 'easier to pick up marks on' A/A* topics that they haven't seen before. We've covered all of the D/C and majority B grade topics and they have been given individual revision sheets based on their performance in these topics (see my previous blog post on 'alexpett's GCSE topic tracker http://goo.gl/fwa7IP).

It's going to be a busy month or so when we get back!

Y11 Revision Board Display

April 15, 2014, 7:13 am

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≪ Previous: Y11 - The Final Countdown

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I went into school today for a couple of things. One was to check the new Desktop PC that was being put into my room synced up to my IWB still (it does) and the other was to put up a new revision display board for the benefit of my Y11s.

I've been putting together a few new posters and some pictures based on the popular 'meme' images that seem to float around the Internet. I tweeted a few of these images out (see below) yesterday as I was creating them and they seemed to go down well. There's a link at the bottom of this post where you can download all of those that I created/found on the web.

In addition to the images, I created a few posters in the style of the USA posters you find on University noticeboards etc where there are tear off slips to take away. I decided to use this style to create a few revision website posters so students can rip them off and take them with them to remind them of the web address/be able to scan a 'takeaway QR Code' to use. I created 3 of these: 1 for my YouTube Channel (mrcollinsmaths), 1 for the school's VLE, where I have a folder of resources for them to use, and 1 for the Pearson revision apps I am trialing (future blog post to follow).
I've also then put on a few quotes that I like and other useful information as to the dates of their examinations, mymaths password/login details etc etc.

Here's how the display looks...

The only thing missing is a 'Y11 Revision Board' title/banner that I forgot to print out (this'll go at the bottom of the display).










Here are the images that I tweeted out yesterday...

 Ace Ventura themed poster

This image appears loads on social media sites - this is one of my favourite posters I created.

 I really like this pie chart I found off the web.

I saw a similar cat picture with this slogan, but it was a bit blurry so I found another (equally funny) cat pic and used the same text.













If you'd like to download these pictures/resources then feel free to click on the below link to my Dropbox folder where you can download to alter/print as you wish...

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/37694946/Revision_Pics.pptx These are the picture images (including the 4 above)

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/37694946/Revision%20Slips_USA%20Style.pptx This file allows you to create your own USA style poster with rip off slips

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/37694946/revision_quotes.docx The few quotes I used.

Feel free to adapt/use the resources above as you wish. Let me know how they go down if you do use them. Tweet me @mrprcollins or comment below.

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Setting the tone for Y11...

April 26, 2014, 12:16 pm

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≪ Previous: Y11 Revision Board Display

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So, we've just had the 1st week back and the 'big push' for our Y11s is well underway. I decided that in the 1st lesson back from Easter with each of my Y11 classes, that I'd give them a bit of a 'spiel' about revision and the run in to their GCSE examinations. Here's what I did...

After the classes had arrived and got sat in their new seats (I change my seating plans each half-term) I referred them to the new display board I put up for them to use. See my previous blog post...http://goo.gl/4NyWz1 I also showed them how many days they now have until their 1st Mathematics examination.
I then, on my IWB, put up my slides I created for them. On the 1st slide I had 4 charts of their progress to date. The 1st chart was of their end of Y10 results to show them where they had come from and where I had picked them up from. The next two were of their 2 main 'mock' exams they had had in February and just before Easter. Lastly, I showed them the chart of their target grades. This was all to show them how far they'd come already this year and where we were headed. I then told them all about the effort still needed, the danger of some of them being happy with the grade their on and therefore perhaps having relaxed a bit. I reminded them they were all capable of certain grades and that just because they're on the grade they 'need' or want they are capable of more (in an attempt to get them to aim higher).

Here's what the graphs looked like...

Simple enough - just to show them clearly how their grades have gone up and where we need to get to.









Next, I gave out to each of them an 8 week revision timetable and a useful list of websites to use for their revision. I started to think over the holidays about how much (or little) they were doing revision wise over the holidays and am always nerved by the lack of control we have over the amount they'll be doing! So, I thought as long as I feel that I've given them all the help I can, I have done all I can and the rest is up to them!

The 8 week timetable covers all of the week just gone and the final week in which they have their 2 Mathematics GCSE examinations. On the timetable, for each class, I highlighted our lessons and those exams from other subjects that may get in the way of our lessons. I stressed how little 'teaching time' we have left and that they need to start planning around their other commitments. I said that if they had jobs or clubs they attend that their revision will have to take place around these. I also drew attention, again, to my 'number of days left' display and said that that included all the weekends and the half term week between now and their exams.

Here's how the timetables look:

At this stage, I asked them how much advice they'd been given in terms of 'how' to revise. There was little response. They had been given, earlier in the year, a 'study skills' day with some external presenters, but other than that they shrugged.





I then drew their attention to the list of useful websites that I had stapled to each of their timetables and referred to the revision display I had put up to remind them of other sites/resources they could use to revise.

Here's the list I gave them...

I suggested my YouTube Channel and any other Mathematics based channel they'd found/used before - I also recommended Hegarty Maths (as it's way better than mine)!
Also on the list was CorbettMaths.com's 5-a-day resources (these are great) and then the resources I have put for them on the school's VLE and of course...mymaths (the main site we use at our school)

After this I went through my [general] top tips for revising (any subject), but tried to link it to their Mathematics as much as possible.

*I told them that this is what I did for my revision and what I had been told had worked for past students, I gave some brief success 'stories' of past students too to motivate them/reach out to those students in similar positions this year.*

Here are the top tips I shared with them:

1) Do little, often and not to overdo it in any one 'sitting' of revision

2) get organised - use the timetables I had handed out and to attend after-school revision sessions where possible (I also told them I now have an even more 'open door' than I have had all year and they can turn up whenever they like for help [break, lunch, after-school, before-school] and said that if I was in my room then I was there to help)!

3) Revise when's best for you. I linked this to my recent goal to go swimming once a day having just got a swimming membership at the local leisure centre. I told them that I was a rubbish morning person and although I'd hoped to go swimming in the morning before school it just doesn't work for me (I did the morning of the INSET day, but then couldn't get myself up early enough before school the other days and so have gone after school), so to revise when's best for them.

4) Music. This is a massive thing for me personally as I also DJ in my spare time and love music. I used to listen to the Lord of the Rings Soundtrack everytime I did any coursework/essays for my degree and this helped settle me into the routine of doing work. I get distracted very easily and so told the class that this has helped me focus in the past. I also tried to link some Psychology into my explanations and how music can be used to aide your memory and recall of information. I did say that this wasn't for everybody but to try it. Although, I do believe in them all having a 'motivational song' and playing this in the morning before every exam to get them psyched up! I then shared too much and told them that my 'motivational song' was S Club 7's 'Don't Stop Moving'.
My top set Y11s do now want me to play this at the start of all of our remaining lessons, my other Y11 class weren't so keen!

5) Post it note and poster all round their houses. I spoke to them about prominent places to put up mind maps and revision posters etc. We discussed those places around the house that we perhaps don't always know we look at on a regular basis and where best to place posters in an attempt to take in the information on the revision posters. Examples were, above (to the side of) door handles, light switches, fridge door, bedroom walls, front door, windows/mirrors, behind the TV/Computer screen (but so it's still visible) etc.

This only took up about 20 minutes of each lesson and the classes responded really well to the information I gave them and were in good spirits. We then got on with the topics we left off on last term and the class were focused throughout and I was impressed with their efforts. I'm under no illusions that there will be times in the next 4 weeks when some will need reminding of the urgency and lack of time to 'mess about', but for now they seem 'on the ball' and in the right frame of mind.

The Action Jackson video is waiting for when I sense a dip in their efforts!

Thanks to @hegartymaths, @Corbettmaths, @Actionjackson for their resources and work that they have freely shared that will go towards making my Y11s successful this Summer!

Oh, and remember...'don't stop moving to the funky funky beat'!!

Getting the most out of my seating plan...

April 26, 2014, 12:46 pm

≫ Next: Revision &'Jenga'!

≪ Previous: Setting the tone for Y11...

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Being the first week back, it's the time of year when I change around my seating plans for each of my classes. I do this to keep them on their toes or to move certain individuals to more prominent places in the room for me to either provide additional support, or be able to keep an eye on them a bit easier etc.

However, each time I change the seating plan I have the same problem of what to do whilst they're all finding their seats and ensuring the best possible start to the lesson. I also want them to have something to be doing when they come in. Obviously, I can write a few questions on the board or hand them a starter task, but in the past it takes them a while to get settled and there's always a bit of a frenzy as they find out who they're sat next to/complain that they're not sat next to their best friend etc. Plus, for this lesson, I had prepared a starter task that was on my notebook slides that obviously couldn't be shown on the IWB at the same time as the seating plan.

So, in order to ensure my students had something to be doing as soon as they walked through the class door I decided to give them a starter task that enabled them to find their seat, whilst doing some basic Mathematics. Now, I'd done this before when getting students into groups or for randomly seating them, but not for getting them into specific seats.

What I did was this...

I put, on my IWB, a copy of my seating plan, but in place of the students names I put the numbers 1-32.

Then, on the table at the front of the class I had slips of paper with each student's name on and a clue/question whose answer would tell them the number seat they were to sit in for this half term. I differentiated the questions for each of my students based on what we had covered this year and the level they were currently working at.

Here's the questions template:

The answers go from left to right and then down to the next row etc. These are cut out like dominoes with the name and clue on one piece of paper.


The good thing about this task is it got my students doing some basic numeracy as they were trying to find out what seat to sit in, there was a lot of enthusiasm as they pondered who they'd end up sitting next to too. I also found that some students would help others once they knew where they were sitting to find out if their friends would be next to them. Also, those that had initially got the wrong seat would be forced to check their question/clue when another student ventured toward the same seat.




There was then a really quick and easy way for me to 'mark' each of their answers and to check they had got their question right...I put up the actual seating plan with all their names on and said if you're not in the right place you need to check your answer! No-one needed to move (which also gave me an indication that I had pitched their individual questions well enough) I was then able to quickly move on to the proper starter I wanted them to do for that lesson and we were off...

I'll definitely use this again in the future and the questions can easily be adapted for different classes now that I have set up the names/questions template and the numbered seating plan.

Revision &'Jenga'!

May 28, 2014, 8:45 am

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Today I went into school, with the majority of our Maths department, for our Y11's revision session. We had about a quarter of our Y11s there and they worked well throughout the morning session (we were there from 9am-12pm).

Last night when thinking about what I could do to engage the students in their revision I remembered the 'Jenga' style games I bought from the local charity shops last Summer. So, with a text book and a black pen in hand I started about writing questions on each of the wooden blocks. Blimey...did this take some doing!! I had good intentions on setting up 2 of these for various groups of students (foundation and higher) to be playing/using for their revision at the same time. However, it took me about 2 and a half hours to do 1 tower of bricks!

Still, I had one of these now set up that I could use forever more with my higher tier students! Here's how the individual bricks looked...

I had to play around with the pens to find one that was thin enough to write clearly on them, but wouldn't rub off the bricks. In the end a 'gel pen' was the best...just so you know!

I wrote 4 questions on each brick, of which there are 60 in a single game's tower, I'm sure I don't need to tell you the number of questions I therefore had to write out...hence, why it took me so long!

The tower looks superb once stacked up and all the questions are visible on the edges/top...

What I like about this is that students can see some of the questions as they decide on which brick to remove (carefully). They then, on successfully removing the brick, are presented with the other questions to attempt too. The group of students that gave the game a whirl (after initial hesitation from students and an over enthusiastic effort from staff) decided to answer their questions on mini whiteboards as they played the game. I sat with them whilst they were playing to see if any help was needed or any questions had to be clarified etc. I was really impressed by the way they approached the game as I was expecting them to be more concerned with playing the game than answering the questions. I even had thoughts of a few just knocking the tower down for the sake of it. None of these things happened!

As the game progresses, and bricks get replaced on the top of the tower, more gaps become apparent and more questions therefore visible - improving the choice of the individual when selecting which brick to remove.

One of the suggestions a colleague had was that they had seen a version of the 'Jenga' game whereby the bricks were coloured and coloured dice were rolled to determine what colour brick had to be removed that go. This could easily be done by colouring in the 2 end faces of each cuboidal brick (there wasn't enough space to write questions here). The game would then become even more challenging and questions on various coloured bricks could be differentiated accordingly (green = A/A*, orange = B, red = D/C etc)

The group that tried the game out seemed to get a lot from it in terms of enjoyment and revision, they were asking me questions at appropriate times to check they knew what they had to do and were checking each other's answers before the next person's go.

I'll be getting this out in the upcoming revision sessions when we go back next week as it seems to have gone down well and did everything I hoped it would and more.

Let me know if you've used anything like this before...@mrprcollins

Playing Cards Display

May 29, 2014, 4:53 am

≫ Next: iPad

≪ Previous: Revision &'Jenga'!

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Earlier this month I came across the following website that was tweeted out (I can't remember from whom though)...

www.playingarts.com

On the site there are 52 playing cards each in the style of a different artist. Naturally, I thought these would be great on display in my classroom so I saved each image, printed them off on card And hey presto...

My personal favourite is the King of Diamonds (it looks vaguely similar to Slimer from the Ghostbusters)!

I shared these with our school's Art department too as currently the Year 9s do a Alphabet project whereby they produce a concertina book, with a page for each letter, each in a different style of art work. I thought it'd be a good variation for those that wanted to do double the work! I'm yet to hear if any student has taken this offer!? :-s

iPad

May 29, 2014, 5:43 am

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The following takes place between 1pm and 2pm...

I'm going to be 30 this year (in Sep)! However, I'm pretty impatient and so when my mother offered to get me an iPad, that she knew I've been wanting for a while, for my birthday, early, I jumped at the chance! Thanks mum!

So, now armed with a brand new iPad Air I've started to download apps and discover the best ways to use it in class, where/when appropriate. Now, I'm sure I'll blog later about the different apps that I have/plan to use, but for now I wanted to write about 2 things...linking my iPad to my class projector and creating a public 'hotspot'.

Last year, when, as part of my school's NQT programme, I had the opportunity to visit a local school where I was given a session on using iPads in a MFL classroom. The teacher that gave the presentation showed us how to link the iPad to the projector and, briefly, how she'd used it with her classes; how she'd invited students to show their work on the iPad, take photos of students work and project them on the board etc etc. So, the first thing I wanted to do when getting my iPad was to see if I could sort out the same.

I sought out the correct leads to do the job, notably a lighting to VGA cable and a VGA extension cable...

I'm now able to show, on my IWB, exactly what is shown on my iPad. Now, as of now all I've really done is mess around with it in my free periods, play angry birds etc. I'm still figuring out how best to use it instead of my IWB and whether I really need to. The main purposes I can see of me wanting to link up to the projector are...

1) to show students work having taken photos in class - maybe then even use the 'Skitch' app to annotate what they've done well/highlight errors etc (or get another student to do this for the rest of the class to see)

2) use and show various apps on screen, there are loads of maths apps that I'm currently browsing through/seeing how best they would work for me and my students in class

Now, I came across a stumbling block with the second point...a lot of the apps I want to use require an internet connection. I don't have a cellular iPad and so rely on WiFi. This, then limits what I'm able to do with my iPad...bugger!

Naturally, I went to see my school's ICT department about getting the school's WiFi password...not allowed it (don't ask)! Apparently, in the undetermined future, they'll be at a stage to allow this, but not now (again, don't ask). So, I thought I was at a wall here and unable to go any further - I even tried picking up a local BT WiFi zone using my BT WiFi app, no success.

Cue one of our enthusiastic ITTs (who already has an iPad himself)...

He, like a comic book superhero, told me about creating a public 'hotspot' from my iPhone! This, to anybody who, like me 2 weeks ago, has never heard of it, is a way of sharing your iPhone's 3G connection! It's extremely simple to set up and having done so, each time I want to access the Internet I just access the public hotspot I have set up and I'm good to go! This as a (hopefully) short term fix whilst my school's ICT catches up, is fine by me and now allows me to start experimenting in class with my new iPad. I can't express how happy I was that day when I found out about the 'hotspot', I had gone from 'well this sucks' to 'look at what I can do with my new iPad'!

Future posts will follow as I find useful apps and figure out how best to use it in class...it is, however, great for watching '24' using my 'Amazon Prime' app (I'm slightly addicted)!

'twenty seven' - Takeaway Mathematics Homework

May 31, 2014, 8:43 pm

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≪ Previous: iPad

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This has been brewing for a while now...

...I've finally had a chance to sit down and create my own version of Ross McGill's (@TeacherToolkit) brilliant 'takeaway homework' idea.

If you haven't already read his excellent '100 Ideas for Outstanding Lessons' then you must go and sort this out. This idea came from that very book (idea #56) and Ross blogged about it, and all those teachers already using their own, on his blog at:

http://teachertoolkit.me/2014/01/28/takeawayhmk-is-unhomework/

This is well worth a read to get the background information on the idea and to see what else is out there that can be used/'magpied'.
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Being the insomniac that I am, I have just created my very own takeaway homework menu and can't wait to introduce this to my students when returning to school, well, I suppose...tomorrow! I would like to introduce my new takeaway restaurant...'twenty seven'...

This is the logo I created for my menu. All my students have had it drummed into them that 27 is my favourite number and so there really was only one name I could have gone with!

FUN FACT: Did you know, 27 is the only number whose sum of its digits is equal to the sum of its prime factors?!


I started scribbling some ideas and tasks for my takeaway menu on my 'Penultimate' app on my iPad and then, having got the basics down, created the above logo. It's pretty much steamrolled from there. I looked at a lot of the other takeaway menus already out there and took inspiration from many of them when creating the rest of my menu. Thank you to all of you who see something similar in mine below! I'm surprised at how much time I've put into the layout and design of it, as well as ensuring the content is sufficient and varied.

Here's how the 'front' looks...

and the 'back'...

I decided to have the menu fold into thirds. After I had designed it and was happy with the layout, etc, I printed it off to see what it'd look like. Here are a few images of the folded version that I'll be handing out to students/having on display in class...

 This is what the front of the menu looks like (when folded)

Here's a view of the folded version, looking inside the menu

 The back of the menu, with the instructions

The inside of the menu, fully opened up.
















I'm really pleased with how the menu has turned out and have now turned my attentions to ensuring I introduce it to students in the right way. I want to make sure I cover any questions they may have about how we're going to be using it.

The thoughts I've had are as follows:

I'll need to see, from them, a piece of homework each week, or at least evidence that they are working on one of the more demanding tasks (a 'main' or 'special'). This way I'll still be 'setting' homework in line with my school's homework policy and the students will be getting the required amount each week/fortnight.
By insisting on students achieving at least 12 chillies throughout the half term this covers the above too.

The students will get full choice over what tasks/combination of tasks they complete and I've tried to include a range of tasks to suit all students interests. Equally, for those that don't have access to certain equipment they'll still have plenty to choose from. This was another reason I chose the name 'twenty seven' - lots of choice!

The tasks are all pretty standard and so should allow students to choose any of them for a particular topic they are studying. I didn't want to have to create one of these takeaway homeworks each week, for every new topic we looked at, and so kept the tasks generic. Mine could probably be used for most subjects - there's only a few 'subject specific' tasks in there.
Equally, students can now take their own 'spin' on the tasks and adapt them as they feel necessary.

This is something I'll look to share with the rest of my department/school after I start seeing the results of it, the homeworks start coming in, students' reactions etc.

In order to track what each student has/hasn't done (chilli wise) I'll add a column to my markbook and update this each week when 'reviewing'/collecting in homework. I'll also need to explain to my classes (the ones I choose to run this with initially) that the same expectations apply in terms of not meeting the required standards. As there is the goal of achieving 12 'chillies' over the course of the half term, I will also have some sort of 'progress check' week whereby students will be reminded of how many chillies they still owe.

I intend on putting a copy of my takeaway homework on the school's VLE for them to refer back to each week. I'll also create a display in my room for them to look at a few laminated copies of the menu and for them to see examples of homeworks completed (as I get them in). I'll share these on here too...watch this space!

In terms of the tasks that are on the menu, I've thought about having exemplar materials to show the students the type of thing I'm looking for with each task. Some of this will naturally come into play when some homeworks start coming in, but ,initially, they may be unaware as to what is expected? Do I need to spend a good half of a lesson explaining the tasks? Now, I don't want to limit what they are capable of here and so feel this will only really be needed to explain the more unusual tasks - tasks like the hexaflexagon and crossnumber (for those students that haven't done one of these in class with me before). I also feel it'll be important to show students examples of 'good' homeworks as they come in to get the class excited about what is being done by others and get them to think about what they can do with the task, how they'd do it differently, how could it be made better etc.

I'll also have to think about how I 'mark' each piece of homework and what 'success criteria' my marking will be based on. Perhaps I'll discuss this with each individual class and together agree on the criteria to be assessed against?

Lots of things to think about. Lots of things that will probably come out of trialing it for a few weeks and seeing where it takes us. Nonetheless, I'm excited about the impact it can have on my students. Homework, at present, is something I set because I'm told I have to. It's something that has become quite predictable in that it'll be a 'complete your mymaths tasks' or 'do this worksheet'. By giving my students the choice of what they do, as long as they do something, it should improve return rates, engagement and (of course) their learning.

Please let me know your thoughts if you're one of the many teachers already using Ross' idea. Let me know what you think about my menu too.
Comment below or find me on Twitter (@mrprcollins)

If you'd like a copy of my menu it can be downloaded from my Dropbox folder here.

'Post-it Note' style Plenary

June 5, 2014, 2:00 pm

≫ Next: takeaway homework - the initial phase

≪ Previous: 'twenty seven' - Takeaway Mathematics Homework

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When I was sifting through my resources to plan a lesson on composite shapes I came across a question from a previous UKMT Junior Challenge. I decided to use this question as a plenary with my Y8 class. When thinking about how to best use the question as a plenary I decided to get the class to use 'post it notes' to indicate to me the answer they believed to be true.

Here's what I did...

I gave each student a post-it note and told them to put their name on it. I then, on my whiteboard, wrote the letters A-E, split into 5 separate columns. On my IWB I then displayed the question to the class and told them that I would read the question out to them, give them a bit of time to think about it, then, when they had an answer, they'd come up to the board and place their named 'post it note' on the board under the letter's column they believed to be true. After reading the question, I gave the class a bit more support by drawing a diagram of the 6 by 8 and 7 by 9 rectangles and then, using SMART notebook, dragged them over the top of one another to create the overlapping shape in the given question. This was a really good visual representation of the problem and soon allowed students to start noticing the dimensions of the shaded areas to work out (see image below).

I was really impressed with how the class responded to the task and praised them for attempting, and doing so well, on a challenging question (I told them about the UKMT Junior Challenge and how we, as a school, usually only enter our set 1 students in KS3 [my Y8 class are set 3 of 4]).

Here was the end result...

You can just about see my supportive diagram on the IWB, overlapped, having previously been drawn separately and then dragged together.

Another great thing about this...the answer was 27! My Y8s thought I had designed the question myself, I had no idea until I checked it through when planning the lesson - a wonderful coincidence (especially having just introduced them to my 'twenty seven' takeaway homework - see http://goo.gl/s6YAln).

When reflecting on the usefulness of the task as a plenary and assessing where my students got to, the one downside I could see, was the potential for students who had no idea to follow the crowd and just place their post-it where everyone else did. Not sure how best to avoid this in future...answers on a postcard please (or in a tweet @mrprcollins)

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takeaway homework - the initial phase

June 18, 2014, 12:11 pm

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Over the May half term I created a takeaway homework menu 'twenty seven' for my classes based on @TeacherToolkit's idea in his '100 Ideas for Secondary Teachers' book. To see this blog post, and my menu, see my previous post here.

Having tweeted out the link to the above post I was overwhelmed by the responses and reactions to the menu and it has already made it into my top 5 blog posts of all time. The corresponding tweets have been favourited and retweeted more than the majority of my tweets and there is clearly a 'good feeling' about this approach to homework.

So, how has the menu/approach gone down with my students?

Initially, I have trialled the approach to homework with 3 of my classes: my year 10 set 1, year 8 set 3 (of 4) and year 9 set 3 (of 4). I gave each of my students their own copy of the menu and ensured there was a copy on the school's VLE for them to access should they lose their hard copy. I showed my students a brief presentation of the menu and used this to explain/give examples of each task as requested from any questions the students had. If you would like to see this presentation (and adapt it/tweak the menu design/layout) then click here. Then, all I had to do was...wait; wait for the homeworks to come in and wait to see the quality of the work produced...

I've kept it simple for my classes, each Wednesday I take in homework and hand back to them the previous Wednesday's homework (this is possible due to teaching all my remaining classes [now that Y11 have left] on a Wednesday each week).
Below I have inserted some photos of just some of the fantastic pieces of work I have had in so far...

 Ok, this has to be my favourite piece that has been handed in so far. Not only does it involve some classic computer game characters (Sonic, Link, Mario etc), but the simultaneous equations used clearly shows application of the students previous learning. Complete this with fantastic art work and presentation it was more than I was hoping for from any of my students!

'Songs to do Maths to'...BRILLIANT! As a superstar DJ myself and creator of 'Maths DJing' this task was right up my street. This student not only listed 14 songs that he found lyrical relevance to what we have been learning this year, but he also then explained the addition of each song in his 'album' and...even put the songs on a CD. His class are now wanting to listen to the songs in one of our lessons later this year!

Here's the 'explanations' as to why each song is included and the CD.

 A really nice 'fortune teller' here including factorising quadratics, simultaneous equations and expanding double brackets

 This student expressed each of the topics we had studied over the course of a term in a tweet, summing up their learning in each in 140 characters. I've put these up on my 'Twitter Board' in class as examples of good 'tweets' to sum up a lesson's learning.

One of the most popular tasks has been to create a '4 pics 1 word' for a key word from one of our recent lessons. This one's from one of my Y8's lesson on angles.

Here's another from one of my Y10's...

Having covered trial and improvement with my Y9 class, one of my students decided to create a revision poster showing an example of what he had learnt. He also included some questions from our subsequent lesson on expanding brackets and simplifying expressions.

Today, when collecting in the 2nd batch of takeaway homework from my Y8s I had one student create a tessellating shape just like we did in class. She even laminated it...nice!

Another of my Y8s decided to create a set of flashcards for key words she'd learnt this year. These must have taken a while to produce and so I awarded her an extra 'chilli' for her efforts.

A favourite among my Y9 class has been the 2 facts and a lie task. This is one example of a nicely presented one. The answer was included on the back to be the 2nd statement, when marking (see more on this below) I highlighted to the student the need to check her 3rd statement.

Another of my Y10s created this set of playing cards. There were questions on one side (linear simultaneous equations) and their answers on the reverse. She made one suit of these.

Here are a selection of the 'tweets' that a combination of students have produced. If having 'tweeted' I gave them a tweet template so that I could put them up in class on my 'Twitter Board'. This also ensures they've stuck to the 140 character limit!

Finally, here is an example of a '100 word challenge' that sums up one of my Y9's learning. I like the reflective nature of this homework and highlighted that I need to check on him next lesson!













So, I've been overwhelmed by the quality of homework I have received from my students. The quality of work and, in some cases, the quantity have been far greater than if they were given 'normal' homework via a worksheet of questions, mymaths task or other task I had set in the past. Has it solved all homework issues...no. Those students that have always lacked in the amount of homework they'd handed in are still needing chasing and detentions set. Some students are doing the bare minimum and I've had to use my feedback to their tasks to try and get more out of them in future homeworks. I've found that those students who have done their homework to the required standard and on time all year have excelled with this approach and some of those that have had issues in handing in homework on time and to the required standard have been engaged in the approach and are now producing excellent pieces of homework and ultimately doing some independent learning.

In addition to the examples shown above I've had about 4 or 5 videos shown to me in class. 1 student is doing a 'Maths Vlog' and is uploading his videos to his YouTube Channel. He asks each week if I can show his weekly vlog to the class, which I've been doing. His videos are quite whimsical and seem to be enjoyed by the class. Another student, bless her, put up a piece of paper on her kitchen wall and got one of her friends to film her explaining how to solve simultaneous equations. She had her iPad to hand as she was delivering her instruction and this was as good as anything else I have received. My Y8s have been enthused by creating their own videos and 2 different students created their own video on how to create a tessellating shape. Both these videos were in excess of 10 mins and they've clearly put in a lot of time and effort here.

So, how do I assess these homeworks and give my students feedback on their tasks?

I've been experimenting with the best way to do this over the last week or so and here's what I've been doing so far...

1) I have set up a 'takeaway homework' display in my class to showcase excellent examples of tasks completed. In addition to this I have put a list of 'honorable mentions' for the week for those students who have created tasks that I am unable to physically stick to the wall (those that have made videos etc). Here's the display...

The menu is on the wall for easy reference, this has come in handy when remembering how many chillies each task is worth!

A slightly wider view!












2) For those students who have gone above and beyond what I had expected I have sent home a postcard. We, as a department, send home postcards to students that have impressed each fortnight. I've used these to highlight the great homework that I've received. Each time I write a postcard I make sure I state the reason, so have clearly said they've received them due to their takeaway homework.

3) I have 'marked' each homework using my WWW/EBI stamp giving the students constructive feedback as to what I like about their takeaway homework and what they could do next time to improve. Here are some examples...

 With this person's tweet I suggested using #s to pick out key words. I later suggested to them that they could define these key words to show their understanding of their meaning.

 Having covered construction of 2D shapes I suggested that this 'logo' could have been improved by using their knowledge of constructions to make a more accurately drawn logo. I suggested that this 'logo' didn't really show much mathematical knowledge/use of anything we had done in class.

 Although this set of questions, to which the answers are 27, are all correct and quite general. I suggested that they could have used the current topic we were studying on areas/volumes to link this task to their learning, rather than having a general mathematical link. This way they'd have practised their newly learnt skills better. I gave an example here of what I meant.

I really liked this homework as the person drew some sketches of triangles, all with missing angles that were 27 degrees! My suggestion was to have accurately drawn the triangles as we had covered SSS, SAS and ASA triangle constructions.

They received one of my 'awards for awesomeness' for this as well as a postcard home. This student had previously struggled to get homeworks in on time and was something I had discussed with his parents recently so I was really impressed by the quality of his work.

A lot of the 2 facts and 1 lie type homeworks have been a bit 'dodgy' and some have had errors in them. This was one I liked as the 2nd statement got me thinking as to it's 'factualness'!? My suggestion was to provide examples for each statement to show it's validity.







4) I have been keeping track of each students' chillies and track that they have handed in something each week. Here's my mark book set up for the rest of the school year...

I have a column for each chilli and a column for each week to check that something has been handed in. This way it's easy for me to tell each student how many chillies they've handed in so far, what they owe and I can chase those that have not handed in their homework. In the past I've kept records like this, but haven't had a separate marksheet for homework. This is something I will continue next year.










If you've got to this point...thanks for reading! This is something I've been really passionate about since the May half term. It's involved a lot of reminding my students of the due dates and what is expected. I have referred to pieces that have been handed in in each of my lessons, trying to give students as much idea as what other classes are producing and what can be done with each task.
Word has got round my department about the approach and I gave a department briefing about how I've been using it this week.
My HoD has adapted the task to use for group work with her classes and this has gone down well with her classes. My school's English HoD has also got word of the menu and requested a copy in the hope of creating something similar in English.

The takeaway homework journey continues and I'll update you on the progress in due course!

If you have any comments I'd love to hear from you about what you think about my approach to the takeaway homework phenomenon. Either comment below or tweet me @mrprcollins

Y2 Problem Solving Day

June 30, 2014, 1:17 pm

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Before reading this post you may be interested in a similar post I produced on the Y6 Problem Solving Day I ran earlier in the year. See that blog post here.

So, having done the Y6 Problem Solving Day I was asked to do a similar day for our local Y2 students. Having enjoyed the Y6 day I was happy to do a similar day for the Y2s and having not taught students this young before I was keen to get some experience here and tailor some different puzzles/problems for them. I decided to run the day very much like I did the Y6 day, by having a series of 'Bases' that the schools would rotate around like a carousel. However, I wanted to tweak things slightly for the younger students.

How I changed the carousel of activities was by having a final 'Team Challenge' in which all 6 schools would carry out the same task together, later to be judged by (it turned out) the library staff! In addition to this, one of the 'Bases' then became a mini-lesson to prepare them for the Team Challenge at the end of the day.

Before I go on to describe all of the 'Bases' and the activities I used on the day I must say at this point how much work and effort was put in by our fantastic Faculty Assistant in organising and arranging the day. All communication to our local Primary Schools went through her, she sorted out all of the refreshments for the day, e-mailed the teachers of my Y8 students who would be helping me on the day, sorted out sticky labels for name badges, printed and wrote certificates for the children and so much more I'm probably not even aware of! So, thank you JST, the day wouldn't have ran as smoothly without your support!

Here are the activities the students did on the day...

Base 1 - Tarsia Puzzle

In this 'Base' the students had to piece together the 24 triangles to create a regular hexagon. On the perimeter of the hexagon there were 12 numbers they then needed to sum to give the total number, which was the answer for that base.

The trick with this task is that there were more than 1 question that had an answer of 60 and 9 and so this affected how the triangles were put together as if not in the right place they would not 'fit'.

If you haven't done these Tarsia puzzles before I suggest you head over to Hermitech Lab for the free downloadable software. There are also lots of these pre-maid puzzles on the TES to download too.

The students had 20 minutes for each base and this was one of the more challenging 'Bases'.

Base 2 - Magic Square(s)

In this base the students had to arrange the 9 number tiles (2 different groups of tiles to choose from: 1 easier, 1 harder) into a 3 by 3 grid so that the rows, columns and the 2 longest diagonals all added up to the same amount.

This, for the harder set of tiles, was quite tricky for the students. The easier set of tiles were more appropriate, yet some did get the answer to the harder set of tiles.

The answers are below for each set...

The harder set of tiles' answer was 99. The easier set of tiles' answer was 18.

As this was one of the harder bases some schools decided to use their 'Clue Tokens' on helping them to complete the task. The 'Clue Tokens' were given to each school at the start of the day to use whenever they needed some help on a task/base. My Y8 helpers that assisted the schools and their students on the day had all the 'clues' given to them alongside the answers to each base. If a school wanted to use a clue token, they were told on the instructions to each base (see my Dropbox folder for these) what the clues would consist of. In this case, if a school wanted to use a Clue Token, they'd give a token to their Y8 helper and they would then either, tell them the number tile that went in the very centre of the 3 by 3 grid, or tell them the total of each row, column and the diagonals.

The 'Clue Tokens' worked well. Each school was given 3 tokens, each worth 5 points. Any unused tokens were added onto their final score.

Base 3 - The Frogs Problem!

This was my favourite base of the day! The frogs came out of a discussion I had with one of my colleagues (CMU) earlier in the year. We were talking about our Perspective Parents' Evening and the tasks we did on this day and I mentioned the Frogs Problem as a possibility for the future, but thought there needed to be some actual Frog teddies or toys for the students to move, rather than have the mymaths task on the computer, or similar. My colleague, one of our school's cover supervisors, then suggested that she could make them for us [she's amazing at stitching and stuff]! A week later a frog found its way to me and on seeing its brilliance asked if she'd make 6 for us to use at PPE and the Y2 Problem Solving Day. After months of her putting together the 6 Frogs and the 7 Lily Pads they were complete and ready for the day. They look fantastic and were an immediate conversation starter when the Y2 students were arriving. The children loved them and loved moving them about to try and rearrange the frogs. If you are unaware of the 'Frogs' Problem' and the Mathematics behind it, just Google it! The students just had to write down the fewest number of moves it took to rearrange the frogs. However, I allowed them to move the frogs both forwards and backwards (left and right) whereas the computer software versions do not allow this. This kept the task going longer than it may have done and schools did not get 'stuck' as they may have if they could not physically move them further without restarting.

The frogs have now been homed in my classroom above one of my windows. All my classes have asked about them and when they got there. They've asked what they were used for, if they'll be using them etc. They'll come out again towards the end of the school year for sure, and at PPE next year!

They fit perfectly between the ceiling and the window cover. The Lily Pads are kept atop one of my bookcases.
















Base 4 - The Horse Race

The good ol' Horse Race. We did this at our PPE evening this year, to great success (on a large grid created on one of our classroom floors using masking tape). So, I thought it'd be great here too. The students had to roll the die to generate the number horse that would move forward one square (drawn on the Magic Whiteboards I laid down [see www.magicwhiteboard.co.uk]) The horse at the end of the grid 1st would win.

All the students were asked was which horse was most likely to win.

The students enjoyed using my large foam dice to generate the numbers and moved some multilink cubes to represent the horses. In future, I need to get some horse toys to move instead to make it a bit more realistic! Some good discussions were heard on this task when the school's teachers/assistants were asking them questions as to why certain horses (1) hadn't moved etc.

Base 5 - Pentominoes

This base involved students placing the 12 pentominoes into a 10 by 6 rectangle. I like this task as it is one of those 'easy access, high challenge' tasks. The students found it challenging and only one school managed to complete the rectangle.

This was another of the bases where 'Clue Tokens' were used. My Y8s had the solution to hand and if/when a token was used, they placed some of the pentominoes correctly for them.




Base 6 - Mini-Lesson to set up the 'Team Challenge'

What I liked about being able to give each school a mini-lesson was that it allowed me to see what they had been learning at school recently and what knowledge they already had about basic 2D and 3D shapes. I was impressed by how much they already knew. Some schools mentioned 'vertices' and other properties of shapes; they linked the position of the midget gems and cocktail sticks to these properties too! Other schools were able to talk to me about the school trips they'd been on and famous bridges they knew that would help them build their bridge for the 'Team Challenge'.

In this mini-lesson, I got students to practise using the midget gems and cocktail sticks to make cubes and tetrahedrons. These would then be used later in the Team Challenge. Students, on seeing the sweets (midget gems) were hooked straight away and this 'base' helped explain the instructions for the later challenge. I used the JustMaths presentation that accompanied their blog post on this task (see below). I had my iPad to help me deliver this presentation and the Y8 helper of each school took over the presentation half way through so I could go round the rest of the bases and ensure everyone was OK and any questions were answered.

I should say at this point that my Y8 helpers were fantastic. They made me proud as I selected the helpers from my own Y8 class. Although they are set 3 of 4, I choose the 7 helpers from my class as I knew them and the top set students are usually used for days like these and the other students in the lower sets don't often get asked. I liked the fact that I choose my students as I already have a good relationship with them and I knew I could trust them to do as asked on the day. They were brilliant throughout. Each was assigned to a different school to follow round the bases and help where needed. They were all given an 'answer pack' and the instructions all the schools would have. They found the bases challenging at times too and being able to answer the questions the younger students were asking them throughout would have given them great confidence. So, thank you to all 7 of them!

The idea for the cocktail sticks/midget gems bridges came from www.justmaths.co.uk and you can see their blog post here. The blog post includes the presentation I used in Base 6 above.

The Team Challenge

The big finale of the day was the 'Team Challenge' where, using what they had learnt in Base 6, they'd create, in their schools, the best bridge they possibly could. The bridge had to be made solely from a 27p (I know!!) bag of midget gems and a box of cocktail sticks. It had to be freestanding for 5 seconds and had to allow a 10-stick of multilink cubes to pass underneath it. The team challenge was very kindly judged by the 2 ladies that work in our Library and their input was very much appreciated - I didn't want to have to award points and so asked them to do it for me! They judged the bridges on their structure, 'sturdyness', appearance and other variables such as height, width and adherence to the rules above.

Here are some of the bridges the students created (I let my 7 Y8 helpers do this task too as an extra team)...

My Y8s' effort!

 The winning school's bridge!

 The winning bridge (partially complete, they added another layer to each 'tower' to make it taller and therefore even more impressive)

The day ended with the presentations of certificates to all students that took part and all the Y8 helpers. Thanks were given to members of staff that helped me throughout the planning and delivery of the day. All students went home with a few mementos of the day (a personalised pen of our school and a fuzzy book pal thing [I'm not really sure what this was if I'm honest, but it looked quite sweet]). Whilst on duty after school later that week I spoke to a parent of one of my Y10 students who works at one of the schools that attended the day and she spoke very highly of the day. I even saw one of the students walking home from our most local primary school (they're right next door) and she made a point of saying hello to me and then explaining to her mum who I was!

I'm yet to send round a survey to the staff that accompanied our primary schools but await their feedback to make the day even better next year. One thing we will be looking at getting is a 'Problem Solving' Trophy to give to the school that wins, rather than a confectionery-based prize!

For all the resources I used on the day, see my public Dropbox folder below...

https://www.dropbox.com/sh/h0do7o7x954kuui/AABsDvhCZzrsmLz1ANAGJzK1a/Y2%20Problem%20Solving%20Day%20Resources

I hope these are of use to others. If there's anything missing please let me know. Anything not in the folder may be included in the links given in this blog post above.

Let me know if you do use some or all of the resources. Comment below or tweet me @mrprcollins.

#nurture1314 - a review

July 29, 2014, 10:28 am

≫ Next: The best number...EVER...27!

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In January this year I wrote a #nurture1314 blog post outlining 14 hopes for 2014 alongside 13 things I was thankful for in 2013. I have seen a few people on Twitter posts reviews on their posts recently and thought it'd be interesting to see what I had achieved alongside the hopes I set out (until re-reading my previous post I had completely forgotten a lot of these).

I have copied my original post below and have added my thoughts/review on each hope - if nothing else this may give me a condensed list of items 'to do' from September, and who knows...someone else might have nothing better to do and read it too?

2014

1) First and foremost to continue to be happy at home, at work, with family and friends and to be healthy throughout 2014. This will probably include eating more healthily and continuing to play football both on a Tuesday evening and on a Friday after-school at 'Staff Football'.
Well this is pretty much going to plan and I'm happy to say I'm now engaged having proposed in February this year (yep...it was on Valentine's Day). I've also been swimming twice a week since the Easter Holidays and so am aiming to be healthier than my former self! Staff Football continued throughout the year and will be back in Sep!

2) At the tail end of the past term I was accepted on an 'Aspiring Middle Leaders' course as part of my schools' partnership with local schools. This course starts on Monday 6th January at our 1st INSET of the year. Instead of taking part in my school's 'normal' INSET day I am going to have the 1st session of the course at one of our partner schools with the other teachers that are on the course. As part of the course I will be leading a working party at my school on 'Numeracy across the Curriculum'. I will have 4 colleagues working with me as part of the working party and hope this will be the 1st step on a ladder to taking on more responsibility in future. Watch out for blog posts (and reflections) on this course as it progresses.
The 'Aspiring Middle Leaders' course went well. I successfully gave a presentation to the deputy heads of my school, as well as the Head of one of our partner schools and the guy that delivered the course. I was presented with a certificate of completion in our end of term staff get together along with my peers who also completed the course. As to what happens now...I'm not sure? Perhaps there will be an opening nearer the end of the 2014/15 school year for a position starting Sep 2015? Time will tell. As for the blog posts and reflections on the course, well that didn't really happen, but I may have time over the next few weeks to post about the numeracy across the curriculum ideas I developed whilst on the course.

3) I have also been put forward as my department's IT representative and as such am now on the school's IT development party and will be attending BETT2014 as our first 'task'. I'm very excited about going to BETT2014, the subsequent TeachMeet that will be held that Friday evening and finding out about all the different IT that could be used in my future teaching. There will undoubtedly be more on this as the year progresses!
BETT was good. At first I found it totally overwhelming as I found it hard to concentrate on one thing at a time with so much going on in the main arena. There hasn't been much else to do with the development on the IT front this year. I do now have a visualiser in my classroom as a result of requests I was asked to put forward from the Mathematics department and have been using this when I can in this last, past term. The one thing I found from BETT is that there are so many things we could be doing, but need more time and resources in place for many of them to become possible. I'm hoping the school's WiFi gets set up as soon as possible so I can start using my iPad much, much more than I'm currently able to and other developments allow me to use certain websites that are currently blocked or not in use. I aim to go 'paperless' in terms of my planning next year and hope the iDoceo app will help me do this - I'm in the process of setting everything up for next year and will be blogging on this front soon...

4) Next school year 2014-2015 I hope to become an ITT/NQT mentor. I was considered for this this year, but was later told that I needed to be in my 3rd year of teaching (at least) to be eligible for the training for the role. Sep 2014 I will start my 3rd year of teaching and so hope that I will be able to undergo the training to then take on an ITT.
This was something I was really grateful for this year. I was asked to help mentor 2 ITTs we had for their second placements this year and subsequently have been on the training course from our ITT provider so I can mentor 'officially' from September. I really enjoyed the experience of supporting our trainees and found it an enlightening experience watching someone else teach my classes; being sat at the back of the room trying to support both my students and my trainee colleague.

5) I would ideally like to blog more over the next 2 terms than I have been able to over the past term at school. I have found my workload go up considerably since completing my NQT year and starting my 100% timetable. The 6 periods of PPA I get a fortnight seem very few and far between and so I need to work smarter and not necessarily harder in order to find the time to do the blogging I have found extremely useful and rewarding.
Hmm...have I blogged more than I was able to at the back end of 2012/13? I'm not sure really, I think I have blogged when I have had something significant to contribute, rather than blogging for the sake of blogging. However, this does not mean to say I will not blog about insignificant stuff at a later date, but I do remember my previous HoD saying how he wanted to blog with greater quality and less quantity - words I took on board!

6) I would like to continue to add to my YouTube Channel and the videos I have already put on there to support my students in the learning of their Mathematics. This is a time consuming job that I like doing, but just don't seem to find as much time for as I'd like. I know that my students benefit from the videos on there, and there have been specific requests from them as to the next videos I can produce for them - namely help with completing the square and quadratic sequences. So, I will aim to get the next lot of 'homework sheet videos' up by the Feb half term and then go from there.
I haven't done this...yet! I thought I had uploaded a few videos, but having just checked it seems I haven't done anything on my YouTube Channel front since November 2013. I still want to add the videos for the 'calculator homeworks' that I will be using with my Y11s next year, but am unsure as to when the time will be found?

7) Along the same route as the YouTube videos I have a plan for the 'numeracy across the curriculum' working party that I will be leading and hope to get my colleagues on board with the idea I have. There will be more on this in the future when I have ironed out a few things. For now, I'll keep the idea close to my chest and this point will serve as reminder for me in the future.
This was developed through the 'Aspiring Middle Leaders' course I completed, but was only small in its impact and so I hope this is something I will look to develop further from September. Blog post to follow on what I did on the course...

8) Begin to think about writing some sort of educational book. This is something that I really want to do. Having been inspired by the likes of @TeacherToolkit and @Maths_Master for their '100 Ideas for Outstanding Lessons' and 'The Magic of Pineapples' books respectively, I'd love to write a book about the teaching of Mathematics, ideas for lessons, perhaps a 'numeracy across the curriculum' book in line with what I'll be doing as part of the aspiring middle leaders course? If there's anyone out there of the book publishing kind that wants to get in touch you can contact me by commenting below or via Twitter: @mrprcollins (here's hoping).
I still really want to do this, at some point. But no progress as of yet!

9) Continue to improve my teaching of Mathematics for my students. This includes everything I do as a teacher: planning, marking, differentiation, assessment for learning, homework, communication, working with my TAs, etc etc. I will continue to use Twitter and the TES to source new ideas and resources. I will use the TeachMeets I am already planning on attending (TMBett2014 and TMSussex) to meet with other professionals and discuss ideas and, of course, I'll continue to work alongside my colleagues to improve the teaching and learning in our school.
This, I'd like to say I have continued to look to do. I've been really enthusiastic about the #takeawayhomework idea and have invested a fair amount of time on this. I am seeing the benefits of this approach to homework, as are my students and I will look to combine this approach with intermittent mixed revision sheets next school year. I'm looking to improve the quality (and consistency) of my AfL techniques next school year by using Craig Barton et al's 'Diagnostic Questions' website http://www.diagnosticquestions.com/. Our department has done a lot of work on marking this year and this will be something that is continued into the next school year. I love my TAs and have loved working with them this year. I hope they'll be as regular in my lessons next school year! Planning - I will hopefully get more middle term planning done this year as I'm good with the short term planning and know the bigger picture of my classes, but need to link them together more effectively from Sep - I'm hoping iDoceo will play a role in enabling this.

10) Book a holiday for the Summer Holidays. Having enjoyed our holiday to Lapland so much we'll be booking a holiday for the summer holidays. This time...somewhere hot and probably for 10-14 days.
We now have a wedding to save up for so we're not going on holiday as such this Summer, we'll be doing 'Summery' things instead - we're off to Eastbourne tomorrow! We may to look to get away somewhere in the xmas holidays?

11) Try to get up to the Emirates Stadium to see Arsenal more than I have been able to over 2013.
I didn't get up to the Emirates once last season. However, I saw the pre-season friendly at Boreham Wood last week, am off to the Emirates Cup on Sunday, Wembley the following Sunday for the Community Shield vs Manchester City and know my dad is planning on getting tickets for a match to coincide with my 30th birthday, so I feel this is sorted now!

12) Like Jo Boaler's 'How to Learn Math' online course I would like to take part in another course like this to improve my pedagogical knowledge and wider mathematical knowledge. Having signed up to Boaler's course over the summer of 2013 I now receive e-mails from Stanford University's online courses and have already seen a few that look interesting.
I haven't found anything online to match Jo's course I took part in this time last year, but have had the 'Aspiring Middle Leaders' course to keep me busy this year I guess?!

13) Organise and host the next #TMSurrey at my school.
Didn't happen last school year, might happen before the end of the year?

14) Based on all of the above...be realistic and don't try to do too much! Focus on what is important and what is needed and prioritise the tasks I have to do with what I would like to do. I believe in having lots of aspirations, but I also realise the need to curb some enthusiasm and save it for doing the day job!
Based on commenting on the above I feel I've achieved a lot of what I set out to do this year (so far), which is far more than I thought I would have. I tend to have a lot of ideas and fail to follow them through completely - I think I'm getting better at concentrating on some of my ideas and developing them further than I used to when I was doing my GTP?! There's still work to be done on some of the above 'hopes' and I'll look to continue developing these into the new school year.

One thing I've failed to mention is that I've now completed my 1st year back at 'my school', have completed my NQT+1 year and, for the first time since going into teaching, don't have to move schools!I look forward to continuing where I left off in September, rather than starting fresh all over again; this will undoubtedly save time and effort next year! I have 3 of my current 5 classes that I'll be teaching again next year (albeit with a few personnel changes here and there due to set changes) and am looking forward to developing my teaching with these classes and to the few new classes I'll be taking on - another chance to set the standards from the off, which will be improved based on experience gained this year.

Thanks for reading...if you did :)

The best number...EVER...27!

August 1, 2014, 9:52 am

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It's a well known fact that my favourite number is 27! All my students know this (or at least they should by now) and so I decided, on putting up some new displays in my classroom, that one would just have to be based on the best number ever.
So, on going into school today, I removed my existing displays, re-backed and bordered them and then put up the 27 display. Here it is...

Ta da! My new 27 display - details of all the facts etc below...

 Here are the other displays (including my room divider which I plan to make a bit more use of this year).

View from the back of the room. Obviously it's a bit of a mess at the moment as there are staples and bits of old backing paper all over the floor, tables and chairs moved about so I could get to the displays etc. It'll all be cleaned and moved back to normal over the INSET days in September.







As for the contents of the 27 board, here are all the great facts that make it the best number ever...
(all of these appear on the board in one way or another)

27 is (UPDATE...almost) the only number where the sum of its digits is equal to the sum of its prime factors (@srcav has since informed me [correctly] that 4's digit is also equal to the sum of its prime factors)!
Batman first appeared in the 27th issue of Detective Comics
The Chemical Element with an atomic number of 27 is Cobalt
Of the 365 numbers that appear in the Bible 27 of them are prime
the 27th digit of Pi is 8
the number 27 appears in the digits of Pi for the first time in positions 28 and 29
The number on Heathrow Airport's runways is 27 as it is on a bearing of 270 degrees
The 27th Pokemon is Sandshrew
27 squared is 729
the Prime Factorisation of 27 is 3 x 3 x 3 or 3 cubed
27 in French is vingt-sept, 27 in German is siebenundzwanzig, 27 in Spanish is veintisiete, 27 in Chinese is er shi qi
My watch, which has the number 27 (and only the number 27) on it, is based on the 'Club 27' generation of famous musicians, all of which died aged 27
There used to be a 27th letter of the Alphabet (&)!
In Roman Numerals the number 27 is XXVII
In words the number 27 is twenty seven
27 appears LOADS in the movies including in Back to the Future (on the time dials in the Delorian), in Elf (the number of the taxi), in 27 dresses and on the front door to Scott Pilgrims' house. All of these are just a few of the examples. I included a QR Code on the display that scans to a web page with all the documented appearances of the number 27 in the movies.
http://27.chrismore.com/2009/11/movies.html <-- link here

There's also a QR Code that scans to the Wikipedia page on Runways to explain the '27' at Heathrow.
There are then some diagrams I drew on 1cm squared paper of a rectangle, triangle and trapezium all of whose areas are 27 cm squared.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runway<-- link here

There are still a few gaps and so I intend to fill these with some laws of indices using 27. The number appears quite frequently in exams due to it being a cube number and so will include some 27 to the power two thirds etc to the display in September.

Other than that, the reason it's my lucky number is that it was the house number I grew up in (and where my parents still live). It appears in my e-mail address and I now live at Flat 27 (we were given a choice of 27 on the 2nd floor or 120 on the 6th floor - It wasn't really a choice)!

I wonder if there are any other teachers out there that have a display of their favourite number? If there are it'd be great to see a picture - tweet me @mrprcollins or comment below!

More of my 'go to' websites

August 5, 2014, 2:50 pm

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I was looking back through my blog posts around this sort of time last year, just to reflect on what I was doing, when I came across my 'go to' resources blog post - http://goo.gl/NczZoB

On looking at the resources/websites, all of which I still regularly use, I thought about those websites that I have used since I wrote the post that I would add to the list. So here they are...

Corbettmaths.com
http://corbettmaths.com/

I've got to say that this is probably my favourite 'go to' resource that I have stumbled upon this school year. I have used the website loads with my GCSE classes and used it when revising in the run in to their examinations. The site has so many resources on it, which so much time has gone into, that it is a treasure chest for Mathematics teachers. Personally, I have used the 5-a-day questions the most, but have recently seen the new addition of the 'conundrums', which look fantastic!
Definitely worth following @Corbettmaths on Twitter for ongoing updates and reminders of the daily questions (3 different versions - numeracy, foundation and higher).

In the last week of the school year I sent an e-mail round to the parents/carers of my Y11 classes next year (my current Y10 classes that I'm continuing to teach in September) to thank them for their support this year and to advise on what the students can be doing over the Summer to ensure their, what I call, 'Mathematical state' doesn't drop over the Summer. In this e-mail I mentioned corbettmaths.com and have asked students to complete 5 days of the 5-a-day resources (at least) over the holidays (when they have spare time). I'm also planning on putting up a 'Have you had your 5-a-day?' display in the corridor outside my room to make other students aware.

Thank you @Corbettmaths!

ilovemathsgames.wordpress.com's 'Puzzle of the Week'
http://ilovemathsgames.wordpress.com/category/puzzle-of-the-week/

Now I was aware of this one this time last year, but for whatever reason I forgot about it (sorry Emily)! This blog has been a godsend when preparing and sending out numeracy 'puzzle(s) of the week' to my tutor group team this year. The weekly puzzles that Emily creates (and freely shares) on her blog are fantastic. The Year 9s have found them both interesting and challenging this year and it has been part of our weekly schedule during tutor time.
Follow Emily (@ilovemathsgames) on Twitter for more great resources etc, thanks Emily!

Cheney Agility Toolkit by @ASTsupportAAli
http://cheneyagilitytoolkit.blogspot.co.uk/

Amjad Ali's collection of teaching ideas is as comprehensive as it possibly could be. There is no lesson idea/game/strategy/activity etc that isn't included on this site, but Amjad regularly updates it with more and more ideas as they are shared throughout the web. I have found this website/blog really useful in the past year when trying to think of a type of activity that would suit the phase of the lesson I had planned. The ideas on the site can add a certain 'umph' to your lesson and with the huge variety of ideas in the toolkit there's bound to be something that could suit any lesson, regardless of what subject/class/age you're teaching.

Follow Amjad on Twitter for the regular updates to the Toolkit @ASTsupportAAli

Diagnostic Questions
http://www.diagnosticquestions.com/

This is the site I WILL be using much more next year. Created by Craig Barton & Simon Woodhead, Diagnostic Questions is a website with 1000s of questions to test previous learning/misconceptions/understanding etc of your students. The questions are gathered from existing resources uploaded to the TES, newly created questions specifically for the website and users ongoing newly created questions. The site allows users to set up an account to make their own quizzes, by either using the 1000s of existing questions on the site, or by creating their own questions to share with others. The site includes a 'random question' feature where a question is chosen at random from the archive for you to use on your IWB. There is an option to choose the answer from those suggested (most questions are multiple choice to ensure misconceptions are addressed) and the correct answer is provided. Some questions even come with explanations as to why students may have believed incorrect answers to be true - explaining some of the misconceptions students have.

I plan on using the questions on the site in a number of different ways:

1) with my ABCD fans as mini quizzes - see http://goo.gl/8h61Rb

2) by putting the options on the whiteboard for students to place a post-it note under the letter of the answer they believe to be true - see http://goo.gl/d8omaJ for an example on this

3) using the random question feature for revision purposes

4) with mini whiteboards

5) in the ICT room to get students to create their own questions/quizzes to share with each other

+ many more I'm sure!

Follow @MathsDQs, @mrbartonmaths and @autographmaths for updates etc.

I'm sure there are other sites/resources that I use regularly that I've forgotten about...still! So I'll probably do a similar thing this time next year...