This report from Professor Adrian Smith’s inquiry into post–14 mathematics was published in February 2004 and investigated why the UK was not meeting the demand for graduates and postgraduates in strongly mathematically oriented subjects.

Making sense of data: 16-19 core skills resource pack consists of five sections:

• General Introduction: an overview of the materials and their uses.

• INSET pack: introduces teachers to some of the ideas of exploratory data analysis.

• Guides to the topic resources: provides...

This activity aims to engage learners because of its connection to everyday life and the mathematical ideas of measurement and ratio underpin work in vocational areas such as Hairdressing when mixing hair dye and Construction when mixing concrete. This activity requires students to understand and use common...

This CBI report, from 2010, states that, ‘At present not enough young people leave school or college with the numeracy and maths skills they need for work and life. The UK must do better’.
 

The report proposes that, ‘More young people must be encouraged to continue their numeracy and maths education...

Malmesbury School is a large comprehensive school in Wiltshire. This case study explores a number of features of the school’s approach to Core maths, including the requirements that need to be met in order to secure entry to the sixth form and the study of Core Maths. 

This statistics assignment for Core Maths students is based on the Nuffield resource ‘Mammals’.

Mammals: Coversheet
This teacher guidance gives an overview of the task including prior student knowledge, suggested approaches and possible extensions.

Mammals: Teacher notes...

In this resource from the DfE Standards Unit students identify equivalent surds and develop their ability to simplify expressions involving surds. Students should understand what a square root is and be able to remove brackets correctly. (GCSE grades A-D; AS and A2 level)

Many of the most powerful magical effects performed today have a mathematical basis. Mathematics is also the secret behind the technologies people use, the products they buy and the jobs they will have. This book shows how to perform some magic tricks, explains the mathematics behind them and how that same...

In order to understand the orbits of planets, comets and other celestial bodies, it is necessary to examine the principles of how gravity, and the velocity of an object, interact to produce an orbit. It is a common misconception among students that planetary orbits are circular. This practical activity gives a...

In this Core Maths activity students are drafted into a company’s marketing department for a day. Students have to make assumptions in order to decide how to budget £100,000 across the three forms of advertising available to them (TV, radio and billboards).

Marketing: Teacher Guidance
...

In this resource from the DfE Standards Unit, students practise differentiating quadratic functions and finding the values of a function and its derivative at specific points. They will distinguish between f (x) and f ′(x), relate values of f (x) and f ′(x) to the graph of y = f (x) and reflect on and discuss these...

In 2009, the Advisory Committee on Mathematics Education (ACME), who provide these resources, embarked on the Mathematical Needs Project to investigate how both the national needs and the individual needs of students, from age five to nineteen in England, could be met by a curriculum, delivery policy and...

The transition into post-compulsory mathematics education is summarised in this resource from the University of Manchester, which contains quotes from students and teachers about their experiences of working with the GCSE mathematics curriculum.

The report includes the following implications from the study...

Cross-curricular work can be incredibly powerful, both in terms of student outcomes and staff Continuing Professional Development. However, it is easy to contemplate, but far more difficult to deliver. Effective planning is the key. At King James’s School, near Huddersfield, members of the mathematics and science...

This report, from Nuffield Foundation, presents the findings of a research project which mapped the mathematical and statistical content in the assessment of six A level subjects: business studies, computing, economics, geography, psychology and sociology.

Analysis of the summer 2010 examination papers from...