This optimisation problem is an ideal opportunity to use the real-world context of logistics as an application of a first fit decreasing algorthim.

In this activity students have to decide how to cut pieces of wood to make a shelving unit using the least number of planks of wood, within certain constraints....

This optimisation problem is an ideal opportunity to use the real-world context of logistics as an application of first fit algorthims.

In this activity students have to allocate a number of different jobs to different employees within certain constraints. As part of the task students are introduced to first...

The aim of each challenge is for students to complete each of the five tasks, recording their results on the answer sheet entitled “To open the padlock”. Students obtaining the correct ‘grand total’ have successfully completed the challenge.

The number padlock challenge contains five number challenges, one...

Act 1

A picture is shown some packs of pain relief tablets...

This activity from Cre8ate maths lends itself to the development of personal thinking and learning skills, based on activities for a playground. Making a maze involves students in quite complex 2-D visualisation, working with a prepared spreadsheet, in excel, which encourages students to refine and redraft their...

The Teaching Primary Science book Paints and materials draws upon some of the materials and techniques of artistic expression to explore ways of asking questions and finding answers in a scientific way. Each chapter contains an activity and a list of materials for...

Palaeontology strives to discover evidence so that we might learn more about the fossil remains of life and understand how they lived, functioned and even died. Scientists at The University of Manchester have been using state-of-the art imaging, chemical analyses and computer modelling techniques to study the...

A podcast from the Planet Earth Online collection and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). Does your shopping basket contain chocolate, biscuits and shampoo? If it does, you may be unwittingly contributing to the destruction of the some of the world's pristine rainforests.

Manufacturers now use...

One way to share success criteria is to create a rubric based on SOLO, as explained by Pam Hook.  Click on ‘wiki’ in the navigation panel, and then head for ‘HookEd wiki’. 

The HookED wiki has a focus on SOLO based approaches and effective strategies to enhance:

Mechanical engineer, Tom Hunt, shows how precision machines are used to produce the PanCam instrument, which will be sent to the European Space Agency to be integrated on to the ExoMars rover.  Electronics engineer, Barry Hancock, shows the filter wheel being tested within the labs, at the Mullard Space Science...

This Operational Research (OR) Society resource  invites students to analyse processes and efficiencies through a series of group challenges.

In the first activity students are asked to produce as many cups as possible by folding paper. Students are also asked to calculate the mean, variance and standard...

This resource, from the Maths Careers website, uses paper folding to investigate the platonic solids and was created in conjunction with More Maths Grads and the University of Leeds.

This activity was designed to be run with Key Stage 3 students and involves constructing several of the platonic solids using...

This resource contains step by step illustrated instructions of how to fold a variety of polygons, using A-size paper. The polygons featured include a square, an equilateral triangle, an isosceles triangle, kites, rhombi, a regular pentagon, a regular hexagon and a regular octagon. There are also investigations on...

In this Nuffield investigation students study paper sizes in the A and B international series, exploring relationships within each series and between the series.

The key processes are:

This group task asks students to design, build, evaluate and test paper planes.

The presentation outlines the expected outcomes and also contains teacher notes. It includes a link to a six minute BBC video about the design features involved when making paper planes.