The fourth and final Royal Society ‘state of the nation’ report considers the ‘pool’ of the UK’s 16–19 year old students taking mainstream science and mathematics combinations suitable for entry to higher education. It makes three major points about these students.

• The size of this ‘pool’ is critical to...

This resource contains four instant maths ideas exploring how to represent data graphically. In the first task students record how long they watch TV, group the results and draw two separate graphs to compare boys and girls. The second task requires students to consider what type of diagram is suitable to represent...

This Mathematics Matters case study looks at the serious problem of coastal erosion. Much of the UK’s coastline is undergoing erosion, placing homes, businesses and other important coastal sites at risk. Mathematical modelling can enable us to understand both the short and long term processes that lead to erosion,...

These diagnostic questions and response activities (contained in the zip file) support students in being able to:

• Identify factors that can increase the pressure of a fluid.
• Explain why the pressure of a fluid is a scalar quantity that is equal in all directions.         
• Explain the...

This Problem Solving with Industry module was devised by the Centre for Science Education in collaboration with local health promotion groups. In this module the problem is to design an effective campaign or a piece of...

This resource, from Politeia, responds to the developments in the educational reform of mathematics, published in 2012. It contains a curriculum, drawn up by Professor David Burghes, Director of the Centre for Innovation in Mathematics Teaching (CIMT) at the University of Plymouth. Particular attention is paid to...

On December 15th 2015 European Space Agency astronaut Tim Peake launched on the six month Principia mission to the International Space Station (ISS). Principia was named after Isaac Newton’s Naturalis Principia Mathematica, describing the principal laws of motion and gravity.

The education and inspiration of...

This report, edited by Wynne Harlen in 2009, sets out the principles that should underpin the science education of all students throughout their schooling. It argues that students should be helped to develop ‘big ideas’ of science and about science that will enable them to understand the scientific aspects of the...

Act 1

A video shows paper being loaded into a printer. The...

This Cre8ate maths resource looks at challenges derived from printing processes where both logic and geometric thinking are required. In Folding booklets students are given a piece of A4 paper which they fold to form a 16 page booklet and, without cutting the folds in the paper, are challenged to number the pages...

This Catalyst article looks at 3D printing, a new technology which is rapidly finding applications. Although probably too slow for mass production it is useful for producing prototypes and tailor-made items. In a 3D printer, layers of polymer beads are printed one on top of the other. Heat melts the polymer beads...

This resource features a task that involves modelling a practical situation using functions and then representing this with a graph.

Students are presented with a situation where tickets are to be printed for a show. Two companies give costings in terms of words. Students must model the situation using...

This resource contains ten instant maths ideas covering a whole range of suggestions that may be used as starter questions, extension questions or probing questions to assess understanding. Areas covered include: * exploring the different answers that can be achieved by completing parts of a complicated calculation...

This interactive excel file shows how the volume of a prism relates to the area of cross section and the length. Various different shapes of cross section are used including pentagons, hexagons, circles and semicircles. In each interactive sheet the cross section can be...