Stretching Practice
Thursday, September 5, 2019
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I currently instruct at a girls' grammer school. This way all of my students are on rails for an H5N1 or A* at GCSE. It's a fleck similar teaching exceed laid all the time, but without the confidence levels you lot would hold off from such brilliant students. They larn novel concepts real rapidly but are frequently unwilling to guide keep risks.Finding suitable resources for such smart as well as hardworking students tin move difficult. If I select exercises that are also easy, they'll experience patronised as well as acquire bored alongside maths. Besides, it's non a proficient purpose of their fourth dimension to produce practise that's also easy. But if I select exercises that are also difficult, they'll move frustrated as well as it won't attention them railroad train fluency. So I pose a lot of effort into ensuring my resources are the appropriate aeroplane of challenge.
It tin move hard to find stretching practice questions. I frequently guide keep to brand my ain worksheets past times piecing together questions from a multifariousness of sources, which tin move actually time-consuming. In this post service I recommend proficient places to seem for challenging questions. I'm focussing on topic specific practice here, non full general employment solving questions similar those from UKMT.
Finding challenge inwards recap
Last calendar week I was planning a lesson on ratio for my Year 10s. My school's schemes of run are the real Definition of a 'spiral curriculum' (mastery people, seem away now!). My students written report ratio as well as proportion inwards Year 7, as well as 1 time to a greater extent than inwards Year 8, as well as 1 time to a greater extent than inwards Year 9. The Year 10 system of run includes 1 lesson recapping ratio. I demand to brand this lesson suitably challenging or it volition move a waste matter of time, but I can't abide by a unmarried GCSE enquiry on ratio that this shape would abide by inwards the slightest fleck difficult. Thankfully my subdivision has around copies of the textbooks from the serial 'Extension Mathematics' which comprise first-class stretching questions. Some examples of their ratio questions are shown below - they're harder than the measure ratio questions inwards other textbooks.
1. Paula finished a cross province race inwards twenty minutes. When Paula finished, Sonia had solely completed 5/8 of the total distance. Sonia’s average speed was 75 metres per infinitesimal less than Paula’s. Find the length of the race as well as Sonia’s speed (in metres per minute).2. Two numbers are such that their difference, their amount as well as their production are inwards the ratio 1:4:15. What are the ii numbers?
3. Find x if 2 + x : 4 + x = 6 + x : 9 + x
Questions similar this volition likely move to a greater extent than commonplace over the adjacent few years equally nosotros laid upwards students for the 'new' GCSEs which volition guide keep a increased focus on employment solving.
Online sources of practise questions
1. CIMT - The Mathematics Enhancement Programme from CIMT offers an extensive collection of exercises for all Key Stages. I was using their website thus much inwards my NQT twelvemonth that I bought a laid of their textbooks to flick through (order shape here). Since then, Craig Barton has real helpfully provided links to CIMT's cloth on his website (via TES) - it's organised past times theme instead of past times book, making it easier to locate what you're looking for. For event if you're teaching angles as well as thus you lot tin access all the cloth through this link, including worksheets, activities as well as assessments.
4. Maths Malakiss - Written past times an experienced maths instructor based inwards Dubai, this website provides a hit of worksheets which include a proficient aeroplane of challenge. H5N1 circle theorem event is shown below.
I of late made a homework on angles for my exceed laid Year nine using questions from this website. I recommend the Windows snipping tool to brand the physical care for of collating questions equally quick as well as painless equally possible.
5. Exam Questions - If you're looking for GCSE practise questions as well as thus there's around first-class sources of questions past times topic, including:
- Bland.in - gratuitous booklets of past times newspaper questions past times theme for Edexcel as well as AQA (model answers are also available to buy).
- Corbett Maths - practice questions past times topic and GCSE practise papers
- KESH Maths Department - collections of past times newspaper questions past times theme as well as grade.
- Maths Genie - a large option of GCSE as well as H5N1 aeroplane questions past times topic.
Questions to brand students think
I desire to halt this post service alongside an event of a enquiry my exceed laid Year nine students of late encountered inwards a test. They'd studied indices (including fractional as well as negative indices) as well as virtually students constitute it pretty straightforward, thus it was hard to abide by a way to actually brand them think. The enquiry below worked good - the vast bulk of students got it wrong. In the event reply shown, at to the lowest degree the pupil attempted to evaluate each expression, although around clear misconceptions guide keep emerged. When I went through the enquiry inwards shape nosotros wrote the decimals equally fractions as well as it all became clear. It was definitely a enquiry worth looking at. This is the variety of affair I should ensure I include inwards my lessons - questions that require proper thinking rather than only next a measure procedure.
