Volume 2

Shape and Space

Colin Foster
Introduction

Teachers are busy people, so I’ll be brief.

Let me tell you what this book isn’t.

• It isn’t a book you have to make time to read; it’s a book that will save you time.
Take it into the classroom and use ideas from it straight away.
Anything requiring preparation or equipment (e.g., photocopies, scissors, an
overhead projector, etc.) begins with the word “NEED” in bold followed by the
details.

• It isn’t a scheme of work, and it isn’t even arranged by age or pupil “level”.
Many of the ideas can be used equally well with pupils at different ages and stages.
Instead the items are simply arranged by topic.
(There is, however, an index at the back linking the “key objectives” from the Key
Stage 3 Framework to the sections in these three volumes.)
The three volumes cover Number and Algebra (1), Shape and Space (2) and
Probability, Statistics, Numeracy and ICT (3).

• It isn’t a book of exercises or worksheets.

Although you’re welcome to photocopy anything you wish, photocopying is
expensive and very little here needs to be photocopied for pupils. Most of the
material is intended to be presented by the teacher orally or on the board.
Answers and comments are given on the right side of most of the pages or
sometimes on separate pages as explained.

This is a book to make notes in. Cross out anything you don’t like or would never use.
Add in your own ideas or references to other resources. Put “8R” (for example) next to
anything you use with that class if you want to remember that you’ve used it with them.

Some of the material in this book will be familiar to many teachers, and I’d like to thank
everyone whose ideas I’ve included. I’m particularly grateful to those people who have
discussed some of these ideas with me; especially Keith Proffitt, Paul Andrews, John
Cooper and Simon Wadsley. Special thanks go to Graham Foster for expert computer
behaviour management!

Colin Foster
July 2003

© Colin Foster, 2003.

2 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

Contents

Volume 2 – Shape and Space

2.1 Polygons 4

2.2 Area and Perimeter 18

2.3 Circles 28

2.4 Angles 38

2.5 Bearings 46

2.6 Trigonometry 51

2.7 Pythagoras’ Theorem 60

2.8 Loci and Constructions 68

2.9 3-d Solids and Nets 76

2.10 Volume 90

2.11 Plans and Elevations 96

2.12 Similarity and Congruence 98

2.13 Symmetry 99

2.14 Tessellations 113

2.15 Dimensions and Units 115

2.16 Compound Measures and Rates 119

of Change

Key Stage 3 Strategy 122

– Key Objectives Index
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 3
2.1 Polygons

• A topic containing lots of definitions. One way to make this interesting is for pupils to look for “hard
cases” that get around other people’s definitions. Or the teacher can do that at the board as the pupils
attempt to define key concepts;
e.g., “A polygon is a shape containing straight lines”, so the teacher
draws something like this (left), and the pupils have to think of a better
definition. “I’m going to be awkward – try and come up with a definition I won’t
be able to get around.” You might eventually end up with something like “a flat
closed shape made up entirely of straight sides”, or better.

• It’s worth emphasising that odd-looking, non-standard polygons (e.g., see

right), are still polygons (it’s even a hexagon), and that there’s nothing
“wrong” with them.
• “Regular” means that all the sides have the same length and all the angles are
equal (or “all the vertices look the same” if “angle” is not yet a clear
concept). It’s helpful to see that both of these conditions must hold by imagining irregular hexagons
like those below.

all sides the same length, all angles the same size, but
but angles different sizes sides different lengths
So the only regular quadrilateral, for instance, is the square (e.g., you can’t have a “regular
trapezium”, etc.).
• Material involving angles in polygons is in section 2.4.

2.1.1 NEED newspaper, scissors and practice! Answers:

Fold a whole sheet of newspaper in half and Ask pupils to predict each time before you open
then in half again. The teacher then cuts a out the newspaper.
shape out of the corner which corresponds to 1. Cut a straight line at 45° to both edges to
the centre of the original sheet. get a square. (Expect pupils to say
“When I open it out, what “diamond” because of the orientation.)
will we see?” 2. A similar cut not at 45° makes a rhombus.
A hole in the middle. 3. Cut lines at 120˚ in a 2:1 ratio as below (left)
cut “What shape will the to make a regular hexagon.
hole be?” 4. Cut lines at 135˚ in a 1:2:1 ratio as below
(right) to make a regular octagon.
Then open and see.
“What shape is it?”
open ends

Pupils can use scrap paper or newspaper to try

to make particular shapes.
You could discuss reflection symmetry. It’s possible to make many other shapes by
experimenting.

2.1.2 “I spy a polygon!”. Looking for polygons in This can be a brief task at the beginning or end
the classroom or around the school. of a lesson.
So long as they don’t have to be regular, there
should be lots. You can declare that “squares You can offer challenges such as “Can anyone
and rectangles are boring”. see a heptagon?”
4 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
 2.1.3 Names of polygons. Make a table (see sheet). 1- and 2-sided polygons don’t exist; the only
Discuss how pupils are going to remember special names for regular polygons are
the names. “equilateral triangle” (3) and “square” (4);
Where do you come across these shapes? otherwise we just say “regular” before the
• quadrilateral: is there a “quad”/court in name.
school?
• pentagon: “Pentagon” in US; The US Pentagon was built in that shape with
• hexagon: they tessellate in bee-hives; the idea that it would be quick to get from any
• heptagon: 20p and 50p coins, although part of the building to any other part.
they’re actually a little rounded at the
corners; Names for polygons with lots of sides are
• octagon: an octopus has 8 tentacles; interesting to some pupils, although we would
• decagon : “decimal”, “decimetre”, etc. probably say “46-gon”, etc. (see sheet).

2.1.4 Where is there a very large, very well-known Answer: (there may be other answers)
triangle? The Bermuda Triangle, in which many planes
Where exactly is it? and ships have gone missing over the years. Its
vertices are at Bermuda, Miami (Florida) and
San Juan (Puerto Rico).

2.1.5 Which letter of the Greek alphabet looks like Answer: Capital delta, the fourth letter of the
a triangle? Greek alphabet, is (the lower case delta is ),
and is used in maths and science, as is the
upside down version ∇.

2.1.6 NEED square dotty paper, or photocopies of Answers:

sets of 3 × 3 squares of dots (see sheets). Equilateral triangles are impossible.
If every vertex must lie on a dot, how many See sheet for the others.
different triangles can you draw on a 3 × 3
square grid of dots? Count as the same any
triangles which are just reflections, rotations You can do a similar task with quadrilaterals
or translations of each other? (see sheet).

2.1.7 NEED acetate of quadrilaterals (see sheet). This can lead to seeing that all squares are
“What have all these shapes got in common?” rectangles, rhombuses and parallelograms, etc.
(polygons, 4 sides, quadrilaterals)
“Pick one and tell me what you would call it.” This may be the time to introduce the notation
“What makes it an X? What does a shape have for equal angles, equal sides and parallel sides.
to have to make it an X?”
You can turn the acetate by quarter turns and
You can offer a challenge: “Who thinks they even turn it over to change the appearance and
could say the name of every shape?” positions of the shapes.

2.1.8 Classifying Quadrilaterals (see sheet). Construct a Venn Diagram or a Flow Diagram
This is more complicated than it may seem at for classifying any quadrilateral; e.g., “Are all
first sight. You need very careful definitions. the sides equal? Y/N”, etc.

The table at the bottom of sheet (or one like it)

can be drawn on the board and completed by
pupils (individually or in groups).

2.1.9 NEED photocopies, scissors and glue. This fits nicely on a double page of a normal
Matching definitions (see sheet). exercise book.
Pupils could work in pairs or individually.
Cut out the statements and the polygon names
and match them up. Could stick them down in
books if you want a permanent record.

2.1.10 Link polygons to co-ordinates (all positive or Pupils can make up their own.
positive and negative), and kill two birds with
one stone. (“Plot these points and join them up – name the
resulting polygon.”)

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 5

2.1.11 Choose a volunteer. They stand at the front of You can do this in teams or against the clock.
the room. Write the name of a polygon on a
piece of paper and show it to the pupil. The Obviously make sure that the class can’t see the
pupil has to describe it without using the word word through the paper! (Whispering the word
you’ve shown them, without drawing anything to the pupil is likely to be too insecure!)
on the board or waving arms around. When
enough information has been given, the pupil You need to decide whether you will allow
chooses another to “guess”, and if correct that things like “you tie string to it and it flies in the
pupil replaces the one at the front. sky”! Really the aim is to be talking about the
mathematical properties of the shapes!

Sometimes you may need to interfere because

pupils guess correctly from poor explanations.
You may sometimes need to penalise guessing “Did it have to be that?” “Have you got enough
by deducting points for wrong guesses. information yet to rule out every other
possibility?”

2.1.12 NEED “Finding Quadrilaterals” sheet. The drawing is accurate, so pupils can measure
Which kind of quadrilateral isn’t there? lines and angles.
A square is the only one missing.
Pupils need to use the ABCD labelling
convention (clockwise or anticlockwise, start All the sides of the shape have to be lines that
anywhere, don’t need to repeat the vertex you are actually drawn in. If you draw in more lines
start at). then there are too many polygons to find.

Can also look for different kinds of triangles Pupils can invent their own version, but may
and for polygons with more than 4 sides. need advising not to make it too complicated!

2.1.13 How many squares of any size can you find in Answer: 27
this drawing? Be systematic:
• side length 1, there are 12;
• side length 2, there are 5;
• side length 12 2 , there are 4;
• side length 2 , there are 5;
• side length 2 2 , there is 1.
So the total is 27.

2.1.14 How many triangles of any size can you find in Answer: 35
this drawing of a pentagram inside a Be systematic again:
pentagon? (edge means edge of the large pentagon)
• small isosceles, there’s 5;
• large isosceles, there’s 5;
• acute-angled containing 1 edge, there’s 5;
• obtuse-angled containing 1 edge, there’s 10;
• obtuse-angled containing 2 edges, there’s 5;
• obtuse-angled inside, there’s 5.
So the total is 35.

2.1.15 Imagination (see sheet). Answers: (“Shape Combinations”)

Pupils may prefer to close their eyes when 1. an obtuse-angled isosceles triangle OR a
trying to visualise these. parallelogram;
The teacher can read them out slowly. 2. a different parallelogram OR an arrowhead;
3. a rhombus;
Answers: (“Clock Polygons”) 4. a parallelogram OR a kite;
1. an equilateral triangle; 2. a square; 5. a triangle (if you do it to all 8 vertices, the
3. a regular hexagon; 4. an isosceles triangle; solid you end up with is called a “truncated
5. a rectangle; 6. a kite; 7. a scalene triangle; cube”);
8. (hard) a right-angled triangle (the angle in a 6. a hexagon (not necessarily a regular one);
semicircle is always 90˚); 9. a trapezium; 7. 7. a parallelogram OR a concave hexagon.
10. an irregular pentagon.
6 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
2.1.16 Polygon People. You can restrict this in some way (e.g., to just
Use pencil and ruler to draw a “polygon triangles). Can make nice display work.
person” made entirely out of polygons. Polygon animals/aliens are obvious
Underneath make a table of “body part” and alternatives.
“polygon name”.
Concave polygons are still polygons.

2.1.17 Start with a square piece of paper. With one Answer: 2 rectangles (congruent or not); or 2
straight cut, what shapes can you make? congruent right-angled isosceles triangles; or 1
right-angled triangle and 1 irregular pentagon
A good task for promoting “exhaustive containing 3 right-angles; or 1 right-angled
thinking” (considering all the possibilities). triangle and 1 right-angled trapezium
(depending on the angle of the cut and whether
it goes through 0, 1 or 2 vertices).

What if you are allowed 2 straight cuts? Lots of possibilities now. You can find them all
by drawing the 4 possibilities above and
considering all the positions of a second line: it
could pass through 0, 1 or 2 vertices; if the first
line went through a vertex the second one may
or may not go through the same vertex; lines
parallel and perpendicular to the first line may
give different possibilities.

2.1.18 Make a poster of polygon vocabulary

illustrating each word to make it easier to
remember; e.g., making the double-l in
para elogram
“parallelogram” into a pair of parallel lines.

2.1.19 NEED scrap paper, scissors. Answer: regular pentagon

Making a Pentagon.
Cut out a thin strip of paper with the same
width all the way along.
Tie a very loose knot and flatten it down.
What shape do you expect to get?

2.1.20 NEED Tangrams (bought or made). It’s worth examining the pieces carefully. This
You can buy plastic sets of pieces or make happens naturally if pupils make their own.
your own out of 1 cm × 1 cm A4 squared paper The most common tangram set (see sheet)
(or A4 card with the shapes photocopied onto comes from cutting up a 4 × 4 square into 7
it – see sheet). pieces. There are 2 pairs of congruent right-
Many different objects/pictures can be made, angled isosceles triangles, another right-angled
ranging from fairly easy to extremely difficult. isosceles triangle, a square and a
parallelogram.
All the pieces must be used in each puzzle, The only one worth turning over is the
and no overlapping is allowed. parallelogram (it’s the only one without at least
1 line of symmetry).

2.1.21 Describing Designs. e.g., quite a difficult one would be

In pairs, pupils turn their chairs so they are
sitting back-to-back. One pupil draws a shape
or combination of shapes (not too
complicated) and the other has some rough
paper. The first pupil has to describe orally
the shape so that the second can accurately
draw it without either pupil seeing the other’s
paper. The second person isn’t allowed to
speak. The final shape has to be in the same
It’s easier to say what to do rather than what is
orientation and about the same size as the
there; e.g., “Put your pen at the centre of the
original. Team-work is the aim.
paper and draw a line straight down for about 6
cm” rather than “there’s a 6 cm straight line
down the middle of the page”.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 7

 Polygon Names
number of
sides
name name if regular
1 - -
2 - -
3 triangle equilateral triangle
4 quadrilateral square
5 pentagon -
6 hexagon -
7 heptagon -
8 octagon -
9 nonagon (or enneagon) -
10 decagon -
11 undecagon (or hendecagon) -
12 dodecagon -

• Equilateral triangle (equal sides) and equiangular triangle (equal angles) both refer to a
regular triangle, whereas a quadrilateral has to be both equilateral (rhombus) and
equiangular (rectangle) to be a square.
• Although other quadrilaterals than squares are common (“regular” in the sense of ordinary),
they are not mathematically regular because they don’t have all their sides of equal length
and all their angles the same size.
• A dodecagon has 12 sides; a dodecahedron is a 3-d solid with 12 faces.

Names above 12 are not commonly used, although they are not too complicated.
Some of the higher ones are as follows. Sometimes there is more than one possible name.

number of
name
sides
13 tridecagon
14 tetradecagon
15 pentadecagon
16 hexadecagon
17 heptadecagon
18 octadecagon
19 enneadecagon
20 icosagon
30 triacontagon
40 tetracontagon
50 pentacontagon
60 hexacontagon
70 heptacontagon
80 octacontagon
90 enneacontagon
100 hectacontagon (hectogon)
1 000 chiliagon
1 000 000 miliagon

• An icosagon has 20 sides; an icosahedron is a 3-d solid with 20 faces.

For polygons with lots of sides, you can say, for example, 46-gon for a 46-sided polygon.

8 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Polygons on 3 × 3 Dotty Grids ANSWERS
Triangles

Right-angled

Acute-angled Obtuse-angled

Quadrilaterals

Squares Rectangle

Parallelograms (rhombuses are not possible) Kite Arrowheads

Trapeziums

There are also 4 other quadrilaterals (below) that you can draw that don’t have special names.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 11

 Classifying Quadrilaterals
Quadrilaterals
Trapeziums

Parallelograms

Rectangles Rhombuses Arrowheads

Squares
Kites

There are different possible definitions: with more “inclusive” definitions, all parallelograms
would count as trapeziums, and kites would include squares, rhombuses and some trapeziums.

Quadrilateral any 4-sided polygon

Parallelogram any quadrilateral with 2 pairs of parallel sides
Rectangle any quadrilateral with 4 right angles
Rhombus any quadrilateral with 4 equal sides
Square any quadrilateral with 4 equal sides and 4 right angles
Trapezium any quadrilateral with only 1 pair of parallel sides
(In an isosceles trapezium, the non-parallel pair of sides are of equal length.)
Kite any quadrilateral with 2 pairs of adjacent equal sides (but not all the
sides equal) and no interior angle bigger than 180°
Arrowhead any quadrilateral with 2 pairs of adjacent equal sides and one
interior angle bigger than 180°
Also, sometimes,
Oblong any rectangle that isn’t a square
Other properties, such as lines of symmetry, orders of rotational symmetry and properties of
diagonals, follow from these definitions.

Properties of Quadrilaterals (things that must be so for anything with that name)

any equal sides? any parallel sides? any equal angles? anything else?
parallelogram 2 opposite pairs 2 opposite pairs 2 opposite pairs order 2 rot symm
rectangle 2 opposite pairs 2 opposite pairs all 90° 2 lines of symm
rhombus all 2 opposite pairs 2 opposite pairs diagonals at 90°
square all 2 opposite pairs all 90° 4 lines of symm
1 opposite pair if 2 adjacent pairs if 1 line of symm if
trapezium 1 opposite pair
isosceles isosceles isosceles
kite 2 adjacent pairs none 1 opposite pair diagonals at 90°
arrowhead 2 adjacent pairs none 1 opposite pair 1 reflex angle

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 13

 I have 4 equal sides
and 4 right angles.
hexagon

I have 4 equal sides.

The sides are not at right angles.
trapezium

I have 4 sides. Opposite sides are

equal. Not all the sides are equal. parallelogram
The sides are at right angles.

I have 5 sides. right-angled triangle

I have 4 sides.
Only 2 sides are parallel.
scalene triangle

I have 4 sides. Opposite sides

are equal. Not all the sides are rhombus
equal. There are no right angles.

I have 6 sides. kite

I have 3 equal sides

and 3 equal angles.
equilateral triangle

I have 3 sides.
One corner is a right angle.
rectangle

I have 3 different sides. isosceles triangle

I have 3 sides.
Two sides only are equal.
pentagon

I have 4 sides. Two pairs of sides

are equal. Only 1 pair of angles square
are equal.

14 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Finding Quadrilaterals Finding Quadrilaterals

A A

H B H B

I I
G C G C

J J

F D F D

E E

Write down the quadrilaterals you can find. Write down the quadrilaterals you can find.

For example, GCDF is a parallelogram For example, GCDF is a parallelogram

What other polygons can you find? What other polygons can you find?
 Imagination

Clock Polygons
What kinds of polygons do you get if you join up these times?
Ignore the minute hand and the second hand and just think about where the hour hand
would be.
1 12.00, 4.00, 8.00
2 12.00, 3.00, 6.00, 9.00
3 12.00, 2.00, 4.00, 6.00, 8.00, 10.00
4 1.00, 6.00, 8.00
5 1.00, 3.00, 7.00, 9.00
6 12.00, 5.00, 10.00, 11.00
7 8.00, 12.00, 3.00
8 10.00, 1.00, 4.00
9 10.00, 1.00, 3.00, 6.00
10 9.00, 12.00, 3.00, 5.00, 7.00

Shape Combinations
1 I take a rectangle that isn’t a square and cut a straight line along one of its diagonals.
I put the two triangles that I get next to each other so that their shorter sides are
touching.
What are the two possible polygons that I end up with?

2 If I do the same thing with a parallelogram, what are the two possibilities this time?

3 I put two congruent equilateral triangles next to each other so that they touch along
one edge.
What shape do I get?

4 If I do the same thing with two isosceles triangles, what are the two possible shapes I
could end up with?

5 If I cut off one corner of a cube (this is called truncating a cube), what flat shape will
have been created where the corner was before?

6 If I place two congruent isosceles trapeziums next to each other so that their longest
sides are in contact, what shape do I get?

7 If I place two congruent isosceles trapeziums next to each other so that they touch
along one of the pair of equal sides, what are the two possible shapes I could end up
with?

16 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Tangrams
Cut along all the lines so that you end up with 7 separate pieces.
You have to use all of the pieces for each puzzle.
You are not allowed to overlap any of the pieces.

B C

G
F

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 17

2.2 Area and Perimeter

• Perimeter is easy to define: it’s the distance all the way round the edge of a shape (land sometimes
has a “perimeter fence”). (The perimeter of a circle is called its circumference.)
Some pupils will want to mark a dot where they start measuring/counting the perimeter so that they
know where to stop. Some may count dots rather than edges and get 1 unit too much.
• Area is a harder concept. “Space” means 3-d to most people, so it may be worth trying to avoid that
word: you could say that area is the amount of surface a shape covers. (Surface area also applies to
3-d solids.) (Loosely, perimeter is how much ink you’d need to draw round the edge of the shape;
area is how much ink you’d need to colour it in.)
• It’s good to get pupils measuring accurately-drawn drawings or objects to get a feel for how small an
area of 20 cm2, for example, actually is.
• For comparisons between volume and surface area of solids, see section 2:10.

2.2.1 Draw two rectangles (e.g., 6 × 4 and 8 × 3) on They’re both rectangles, both contain the same
a squared whiteboard (or squared acetate). number of squares, both have same area.
“Here are two shapes. What’s the same about One is long and thin, different side lengths.
them and what’s different?”
Work out how many squares they cover. Infinitely many; e.g., 2.4 cm by 10 cm.
(Imagine they’re cm2.) Are there any other 23 is prime, so there wouldn’t be any all-
rectangles that have an area of 24 cm2? integer-sided rectangles.
Why do you think I chose 24 cm2 and not 23?
(See related section 2.2.7.)

2.2.2 What different units can area be measured in? Answers: common ones such as cm2, m2, km2,
When might each be appropriate? square miles, sq inches, sq ft, etc.
A chart like this may help:
÷100 ÷100 ÷100 “Are” (metric) should not be confused with the
word “area” or the unit “acre” (imperial):
m2 are hectare km2 1 acre = 4840 square yards, and
1 acre = 0.4 hectares = 40 ares.
×100 ×100 ×100

2.2.3 NEED A4 1 cm × 1 cm squared paper. See whose foot is closest to exactly 100 cm2!
Measure area of closed hand (left if right-
handed, right if left-handed) and either foot Pupils can draw the biggest rectangle (integer
(remove shoe but not sock). sides) possible inside the shape and then use
Count squares which are more than half filled; base × height to work out how many squares
ignore the others. Put a dot in the middle of are there. Then just count the ones round the
squares that you’ve counted. edge. This saves time.

2.2.4 NEED squared or square dotty paper. Answer:

Pick’s Theorem (1859-1942). Let i = number of dots inside the polygon and
Draw any polygon (not too big or complicated b = number of dots on the boundary (including
to start with) on the dotty paper. All the the vertices).
vertices must lie on dots. Then Pick’s Theorem says that area = i + 12 b − 1 .
Work out the area of the polygon.
(Break it up into simpler shapes like triangles Proving this simple-looking formula is hard.
or rectangles.)
Count the number of dots inside the shape.
Count the number of dots on the boundary It turns out to have something to do with Euler’s
(including the vertices themselves). formula for polyhedra:
Look for a connection between these three vertices + faces = edges + 2
quantities. (section 2.9.5).

18 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 2.2.5 Comparing Area and Perimeter. Answers: (there are many other possibilities)
It depends what units you use, but if you a p
measure in “units” and “square of the same 1
units”, you can ask questions like these. 6 10
Draw shapes on 1 cm × 1 cm squared paper
which have areas ( a , in cm2) and perimeters
2
( p , cm) connected in the following ways:
4 10
The shapes must be made entirely of squares
that meet along their edges.
3
Connection between p and a 4 8

1 p = a+4 4
2 p = a+6
5 10
3 p = 2a , a square
4 p = 2a , not a square 5
5 p = a , a square
6 p = a , not a square 16 16
7 a = 2p

18 18

Why are the perimeters of these shapes

7
always even?

If when going round the edge of a shape you

move an integer number of spaces to the right,
you must come back the same integer number
of spaces. Likewise with up and down, so the 64 32
total number of moves must be even, because
it’s the sum of two even numbers.

(So this applies only to rectilinear shapes:

polygons where all the interior angles are right-
angles.)

2.2.6 NEED pieces of card (see sheet) and OHP. Pupils could use the pieces to prove the
Area Dissections. formulas to one another.
Demonstrate area formulas.
1. Triangle. Start with triangle 1 and label the Implicit in each proof is the idea that you could
base as b and the height as h . Introduce always perform the same dissections and
the two pieces of triangle 2 (which is rearrangements whatever the precise shape.
congruent to triangle 1) and show that
together with triangle 1 they make a
1
rectangle of area bh . So triangle area = 2
bh .
2. Parallelogram. Label the base as b and
the height as h . Remove the triangular
end and show that it fits onto the other end
to make a rectangle of area bh . So parallelogram area = bh .
3. Trapezium. Label the height as h and the
parallel sides as a and b . Introduce the So trapezium area = 1
2
( a + b) h .
other (congruent) trapezium (upside (Notice that if a = 0 (or b = 0 ), the shape
down) and show that together they make a becomes a triangle and the area formula
parallelogram of area (a + b)h .
becomes 12 bh , as it should.)

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 19

 2.2.7 Draw a rectangle with an area of 24 cm2. Answers:
(This builds on section 2.2.1.) Rectangles with integer sides and area 24 cm2:
Work out its perimeter and write it inside. rectangle perimeter rectangle perimeter
Repeat. 1 × 24 50 (max) 2 × 12 28
What are the biggest and smallest perimeters 3×8 22 4×6 20 (min)
you can find? If non-integer values are allowed, then the
You are not allowed to change the total area. smallest perimeter would come from the
square, which has sides 24 = 4.9 units and a
perimeter of 19.6 units.
The largest would come from a very long thin
With integer sides, the smallest perimeter rectangle δ by 24 , where δ is small. The
belongs to the rectangle most like a square. δ
The largest perimeter comes from the rectangle perimeter would be 2(δ + 24
δ
) , which tends to
of width 1 cm. infinity as δ gets smaller and smaller. So you
could make the perimeter as large as you like.
Why do you think I chose 24 cm2 and not, say, 24 has lots of factors; 23 is prime.
23 cm2 for the area?

What if I fix the perimeter at 24 cm, and ask for Rectangles with integer sides and a perimeter
the biggest and smallest areas you can make? of 24 cm:
Still only rectangles are allowed. rectangle area rectangle area
1 × 11 11 2 × 10 20
You may need to hint that a square is a 3×9 27 4×8 32
rectangle and so is allowed without giving the 5×7 35 6×6 36
game away!
Again, the largest area for a given perimeter
(or smallest perimeter for a given area) comes
from the square.
Areas as small as you like come from rectangles
δ by 12 − δ , where δ is small, and have area
(This investigation is extended in section 2.6.9)
δ (12 − δ ) , which tends to zero as δ gets smaller
and smaller.

2.2.8 How many colours do you need to colour the Answer: only 2 colours needed
countries on a map? e.g.,
Draw a pattern (not too complicated) without
taking your pen off the paper. You can cross
over yourself, but you must finish at the point
you started.
If you want to colour it in so that always when
two areas have a side in common they are
different colours, how many colours do you
need? (It’s OK for the same colours to touch at
a point, just not at a side.) e.g.,

What if you don’t finish at the point you

started?

This time you need up to 3 colours.

Can you find a design that needs more than 3
different colours? Some designs need 4 colours; e.g.,
(You are allowed to take your pen off the
paper during the drawing, now.)

Any “map” can be coloured with at most 4

colours. This “Four Colour Theorem” is very (Remember that the outside needs colouring –
hard to prove, but was eventually done using white in this case.)
computers. (This was the first major theorem to
be proved using a computer.)
20 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
 2.2.9 Polyominoes (1 cm × 1 cm or 0.5 cm × 0.5 cm Answer:
squared paper is useful). The numbers grow very quickly.
Start with dominoes – there’s only one no. of no. of poly-
name
possible flat shape you can make by placing squares ominoes
two squares next to each other. They mustn’t 1 square 1
overlap and they may only touch edge-to- 2 domino 1
edge. 3 triomino 2
What about triominoes (3 squares), and so on? 4 tetromino 5
How many different ones can you find? 5 pentomino 12
6 hexomino 35
The number of squares a is the area, and for
7 heptomino 108
a ≤ 3 the perimeter p is the same for each
8 octomino 369
polyomino of that size and equal to 2(a + 1) . 9 nonomino 1285
There is no simple pattern to these numbers.
The 12 pentominoes are sometimes referred to (From 7 onwards some of the polyominoes
by the capital letters they look most like: contain holes.)
FILNPTUVWXYZ.
no. of no. of poly-
You can do a similar thing with equilateral name
triang’s iamonds
triangles (the shapes are called polyiamonds) 1 equil. triangle 1
and with hexagons (polyhexes). 2 diamond 1
How many of those can you find? 3 triamond 1
4 tetriamond 3
5 pentiamond 4
6 hexiamond 12
The three tetriamonds are the three possible 7 heptiamond 24
nets for a tetrahedron. 8 octiamond 66
9 enneiamond 160

no. of no. of poly-

name
hex’ns hexes
Polyhexes (made up of regular hexagons) have 1 hexagon 1
relevance in organic chemistry because they 2 dihex 1
give the number of possible isomers of some of 3 trihex 3
the aromatic hydrocarbons. For example the 4 tetrahex 7
three trihexes correspond to anthracene, 5 pentahex 22
phenanthrene and phenalene (all C14H10), 6 hexahex 82
where the hexagons are rings of carbon atoms 7 heptahex 333
with hydrogen atoms attached. 8 octahex 1448
9 enneiahex 6572

2.2.10 A politician claims that the world isn’t Answer: He may be exaggerating, but not that
overcrowded at all. He says that every person much. Assuming that there are about 6.5 × 109
in the world could have an average-sized people in the world, and each average-sized
house (and garden) and the whole lot would fit property measures about 20 m × 20 m, then the
into California.
total area needed = 6.5 × 109 × 20 × 20 =
What do you think?
What data would you need to test his claim? 2.6 × 1012 m2.
Since 1 km2 = 106 m2, this is only about 3 × 106
km2. The area of the USA is about 9.5 × 106 km2,
The area of California is about 4 × 105 km2, so so this is about 14 of that.
he is about 7 times out.
To make the sums easier, we’ll give everyone
My aunt says you could fit everyone in the
0.5 m by 0.5 m = 0.25 m2, which should be
world onto the Isle of Wight if they lined up
enough room.
shoulder-to-shoulder (all standing on the
ground). Is that possible? Total area = 6.5 ×109 × 0.25 m2 = 1625 km2. This
is about 40 km by 40 km, or 635 square miles.
Again, my aunt is exaggerating but not all that This is about four times the area of the Isle of
much. Wight (about 150 square miles).
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 21
2.2.11 Display cabinets. Answers:
A museum curator wants to arrange her glass The cabinets have to touch along the sides.
display cabinets so that visitors can view the
exhibits. She has 9 square cabinets. What is
the best arrangement? With a 3 × 3 arrangement, it would be very
difficult to see the cabinet that is in the middle,
and the others could only be viewed from 1 or
at most 2 sides.

You want to get the maximum perimeter so that

Why would a 3 × 3 square arrangement be a there’s the maximum number of sides people
bad idea? can view from.

Draw the maximum perimeter arrangement if

the cabinets must be connected side to side
(not corner to corner).
Always put the cabinets in a single line. In fact
Find a connection between the number of
simple turns don’t affect the perimeter; e.g., this
cabinets and the maximum perimeter.
arrangement has the same perimeter (20) as
the L-shape below.
If the cabinets could touch only at the corners,
the maximum perimeter would be 4n ; e.g.,

If n is the number of cabinets, then the

maximum perimeter is 2n + 2 .
In a different room she wants to use cabinets With n equilateral triangles, the maximum
shaped like equilateral triangles (when perimeter is n + 2 ; for regular pentagons, the
viewed from above). Find a formula for the
maximum perimeter is 3n + 2 .
maximum perimeter when she uses different
For an r -sided regular polygon, the maximum
numbers of these cabinets.
What about other regular polygon cabinets? perimeter is (r − 2)n + 2 .

2.2.12 Areas of Parallelograms (see sheet). Answers (in square units):

Investigating what controls the area of a A. 10; B. 15; C. 3; D. 6; E. 9; F. 12;
parallelogram. G. 10; H. 10; I. 10; J. 10.

2.2.13 NEED A4 1 cm × 1 cm squared paper. Makes good display work and combines
“Design a Zoo” (see sheet). different aspects of maths. An enjoyable task.

2.2.14 A ream of A4 paper is described as 80 g/m2. Answer:

What is the mass of an individual sheet? 1 sheet weighs 0.21 × 0.297 × 80 = 5 g (approx)
How much does the whole packet weigh? 500 sheets weigh about 2.5 kg.
How many could I send first class? If the maximum mass for the cheapest postage
(Assume that the envelope weighs 10 g.) rate is, say, 60 g, then we could put 10 sheets of
paper in the envelope. (This ignores the mass of
A “ream” of paper is 500 sheets. the stamp and any ink.)

2.2.15 Two people, Alison and Billy, own some land Answer:
as shown below.

A B
A B

Draw in the parallel dashed lines as above.

They want to replace the V-shaped fence with Then the new fence should be either of the thick
a straight line so that their plots will have a black lines, because the area of the obtuse-
more convenient shape, but they must keep angled triangle is the same as the areas of the
the same amounts of land each. right-angled triangles with the same base and
Where should the line go? the same height, so A can have one of those
(The land is equally good everywhere.) instead with no change in area.
22 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
2.2.16 196 soldiers are marching in a square Answers:
arrangement. The soldiers at the edge of the For n 2 soldiers, there will be 4n − 4 on the
square have to carry a flag. How many of perimeter (4 sides of n soldiers makes 4n , but
these “outside” soldiers are there? the 4 at the corners get counted twice because
How many “inside” (non-flag-carrying) they each belong to two sides, so we have to
soldiers are there? subtract those 4).
The inside soldiers make a square arrangement
Altogether, 4n − 4 + (n − 2) 2 of (n − 2) 2 .
= 4n − 4 + n 2 − 4n + 4
= n2 So for 142 (196) soldiers, the number outside is
52 and the number inside is 144, so 52 flags are
as it should do.
needed.

2.2.17 NEED tape measures, possibly other things as Answer: the value is not too important – it’s the
well. Estimate the surface area of a human process adopted that matters – but suggested
being. values are given below.

Practical methods: e.g., wrap someone up in Values will obviously depend on the size of the
newspaper; use sticky tape and remove the pupils.
wrapping by cutting carefully with scissors so
that when flattened out it approximates the Theoretical approximation:
area. Head: 4π r 2 = 4π 102 = 1300 cm2;
Trunk:
Theoretical methods: e.g., ignore hands, feet, 2 × (50 × 50 + 20 × 50 + 50 × 20) = 9000 cm2;
etc., and treat the human body as a sphere on Arms:
top of a cuboid with two identical cylindrical 2 × 2π rl = 2 × 2 × 3.14 × 4 × 50 = 2500 cm2;
arms and two bigger identical cylindrical Legs:
legs. (Different pupils may decide on different
2 × 2π rl = 2 × 2 × 3.14 × 6 × 80 = 6000 cm2;
assumptions.)
So total estimate = 18 800 cm2 = 2 m2
approximately, which seems sensible.
(Lungs have surface area of about 100 m2, and
(See similar task in section 2.10.14.)
the intestines about 300 m2!)

2.2.18 Estimate how many tins of paint you would Again, the thinking that pupils go through is
need to paint this classroom. much more important than the final estimate.

Before you start decide if there’s anything you e.g., how many coats of paint?; are we painting
need to ask me? behind the cupboards?; are we doing the
ceiling? are we doing the door? etc.

You could state that an “average” tin of paint

will cover about 15 m2.

2.2.19 Heron’s Formula (Heron of Alexandria, about Also known as Hero’s Formula.
AD 10-75) (see sheet).
A formula for calculating the area of a triangle
given only the lengths of the sides. This formula probably should be more widely
known and used.

2.2.20 Tolstoy (1828-1910) wrote a short story called (It’s an interesting story pupils may like to read
“How Much Land Does A Man Need?” in – not too long and with a twist at the end – and
which a peasant man called Pahóm is offered impressive to say you’ve read some Tolstoy!)
some land at a price of “1000 roubles per
day”. What shape path would you take? Would you
It turns out that he can have as much land as run or walk? Would it be more efficient in the
he can go round by foot between sunrise and long run to take breaks? What if you saw some
sunset, but he must finish back where he particularly good land? What would you do
started before the sun goes down. about hills?
What would your strategy be if you wanted to
get as much land as possible?

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 23

 Area Dissections
Photocopy onto card and cut along all the lines. Keep the pieces in an envelope.
Use to demonstrate area formulas (see notes).

triangle 1

triangle 2
triangle 2
parallelogram

parallelogram

trapezium trapezium

24 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Areas of Parallelograms
Draw some axes from 0 to 8 horizontally and vertically.
One set should do (with a bit of overlapping) for A to F, and another one for G to J.

Plot each of these parallelograms.

Work out their areas by breaking them into triangles or rectangles.
Record your results.

A (1, 6) (2, 8) (7, 8) (6, 6)

B (0, 6) (5, 6) (7, 3) (2, 3)
C (7, 5) (8, 6) (8, 3) (7, 2)
D (0, 2) (0, 4) (3, 2) (3, 0)
E (4, 0) (3, 3) (6, 3) (7, 0)
F (1, 5) (3, 7) (7, 5) (5, 3)

G (0, 6) (1, 8) (6, 8) (5, 6)

H (0, 4) (2, 6) (7, 6) (5, 4)
I (0, 2) (3, 4) (8, 4) (5, 2)
J (1, 0) (0, 2) (5, 2) (6, 0)

What things affect the area of a parallelogram and what things make no difference?

Areas of Parallelograms
Draw some axes from 0 to 8 horizontally and vertically.
One set should do (with a bit of overlapping) for A to F, and another one for G to J.

Plot each of these parallelograms.

Work out their areas by breaking them into triangles or rectangles.
Record your results.

A (1, 6) (2, 8) (7, 8) (6, 6)

B (0, 6) (5, 6) (7, 3) (2, 3)
C (7, 5) (8, 6) (8, 3) (7, 2)
D (0, 2) (0, 4) (3, 2) (3, 0)
E (4, 0) (3, 3) (6, 3) (7, 0)
F (1, 5) (3, 7) (7, 5) (5, 3)

G (0, 6) (1, 8) (6, 8) (5, 6)

H (0, 4) (2, 6) (7, 6) (5, 4)
I (0, 2) (3, 4) (8, 4) (5, 2)
J (1, 0) (0, 2) (5, 2) (6, 0)

What things affect the area of a parallelogram and what things make no difference?
 Design a Zoo!
(Teachers’ Notes)

• There will be 10 animals to house in the zoo.

• Each animal will have a separate cage.

All the cages will be made of 6 squares but arranged differently so that each cage is
a different shape.

• Take an A4 piece of 1 cm × 1 cm squared paper.

This will be your plan for the zoo.
Use a scale of 1 cm to 1 m and draw the cages, spreading them out over the page.
Each cage will have an area of 6 m2.
Label which cage is for which animal.

• The floor material for the cage will cost £500 per m2. (All prices include labour!)
So for 10 cages you will have to spend 10 × 6 × 500 = £30 000.
Head another sheet of paper “Accounts” and record this cost.
Show how you worked it out.

• Every cage needs fencing round the edge.

This costs £200 per m.
Calculate the perimeter of each cage – they won’t all be the same.
Find the total of all the perimeters and multiply this by £200 to find the total fencing
cost.
Put all of this on your accounts sheet.

• Your budget for designing the whole zoo is £250 000.

You cannot go over this.

• Things to add:
o path to take visitors round the zoo so they can look into each cage.
Design it and work out how much it will cost.
Cost = £100 per m2.
o signs to show the visitors what’s where
Cost = £50 each
o car park
Cost = £50 per m2 of gravel
o trees
Cost = £25 each
o toilets
Cost = £7 500
o café
Cost = £25 000

• What other things could you add? Your teacher will give you a quotation!
You must keep within budget!
How much would you charge people to visit the zoo?

• Do you think that the cages would be large enough?

Do you think that the prices are realistic?

26 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Heron’s Formula
Consider any triangle in which the lengths of the sides a , b and c are known and we wish to
find the area.
C

a b

B A
c

We can use the cosine rule to work out one of the angles ( C ) and then use the formula
area = 12 ab sin C to find the area.

a2 + b2 − c2
Using the cosine rule, c 2 = a 2 + b 2 − 2ab cos C , so cos C = .
2ab
Using the identity sin 2 C + cos 2 C ≡ 1 , we can find an expression for sin C , and we get
2
a 2 + b2 − c2 4a 2b 2 − ( a 2 + b 2 − c 2 ) 2
sin C = 1 − cos C = 1 −
2
= .
2ab 4a 2b 2

Now using area = 12 ab sin C we get

4a 2b 2 − ( a 2 + b 2 − c 2 ) 2
area = ab 1
2 = 1
4 4a 2 b 2 − ( a 2 + b 2 − c 2 ) 2 .
4a 2b 2

Factorising the difference of two squares inside the square root sign gives

area = 1
4 {2ab + (a 2 + b 2 − c 2 )}{2ab − (a 2 + b 2 − c 2 )} , and rearranging and factorising again
gives area = 1
4 {(a + b) 2 − c 2 }{c 2 − (a − b) 2 } .

Again using the difference of two squares we get

area = 1
4 (a + b + c)(a + b − c)(a − b + c)(c − a + b)
a+b+c a+b−c a +c −b b+c−a
=
2 2 2 2
a+b+c b+c−a a +c −b a+b−c
=
2 2 2 2
= s ( s − a)( s − b)( s − c)
a+b+c
where s = the semi-perimeter = .
2
This formula area = s ( s − a )( s − b)( s − c) for the area in terms of the semi-perimeter s and the
sides a , b and c is called Heron’s Formula.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 27

2.3 Circles

• Note that “circumference”, “diameter”, “radius”, etc. can refer either to the lines themselves
(“things”) or to the lengths of those lines; e.g., the length of a radius is often just called the radius.
• All circles are mathematically similar (like all squares, for example, but unlike, say, all right-angled
triangles).
• You can write the area formula as r 2π to avoid the danger of calculating (π r ) 2 instead of π r 2 .
• There are lots of definitions to grasp: an arc is part of the circumference of a circle; a chord is a
straight line joining two points on the circumference (a diameter is a chord that goes through the
centre); a tangent is a straight line touching the circumference at one point only; a sector is the area
between an arc and two radii (a semicircle is a sector which is half a circle; a quadrant is a sector
which is a quarter of a circle); a segment is the area between a chord and an arc. (Segments and
sectors are easy to muddle up – a semicircle is both.) Circumference is just the perimeter of a circle.
• Material using Pythagoras’ theorem in the context of circles is in section 2.7.

2.3.1 NEED string or tape measures and “round” This leads to a value of π of about 3 (or
objects or “Circles” sheet, callipers if you “3 and a bit”). It’s nice to demonstrate this
have them. “3 and a bit” if there’s a fairly large (> 1 m
Practical Investigation: we’re going to diameter) circular object in school. Wrap the
discover something interesting about circles. string around the outside and cut it the length of
Bring in or find circular objects (or objects the circumference. Measure with it across the
with circular cross-section): dinner plate, middle 3 times, and “a bit” is left over. (This
clock, football, window, tiles, rubber, pencil can be quite a memorable demonstration.)
sharpener, food tin, cup, marker pen, bin,
sticky tape, someone’s arm. It’s pretty amazing that c = π d works regardless
Measure the circumference and the diameter. of scale; e.g., for a microscopic water drop or a
Is there a connection between these two giant star or planet’s orbit.
amounts?
In practice, it’s usually easier to measure the
Divide the circumference by the diameter diameter than the circumference, because
(use the same units). What do you get? straight lines are easier to measure accurately,
but sometimes you can’t “get at” the diameter
Pupils will realise that you can’t get π very (e.g., a pipe), and then it’s useful to be able to
accurately by this method! calculate the diameter from the circumference.

2.3.2 What is it about circles that makes them good Answer: It’s their constant “width” (diameter)
for wheels? Is there any other kind of shape regardless of orientation, so that whatever is
that would do? travelling on top is always the same height off
the ground.

Other shapes do that; e.g., a Reuleaux triangle

(Franz Reuleaux, 1829-1905), formed by adding
arcs to each side of an equilateral triangle
(radius the same as the lengths of the sides of
the triangle) – see left.
Although something resting on top would be
This shape is also used for drills that drill carried horizontally, the centre of the wheel
“square” holes (almost square – the corners wobbles up and down, so it wouldn’t be any
aren’t quite right). good on an axle.

Which other polygons can you make curvy It works for all the regular polygons that have
versions of like this? an odd number of sides; seven-sided versions
are used for 20 p and 50 p coins. Their constant
These are sometimes called “rolling polygons”. width regardless of orientation helps in slot
machines.

28 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 2.3.3 Could you describe a circle over the This is quite hard, although it seems like such a
telephone to someone who didn’t know what simple thing! You could say “a set of all the
one was? (Imagine an alien who doesn’t know, possible points that are a certain fixed distance
for example, what a football looks like or what from a fixed point in 2 dimensions.”
we mean by “round”.) (This would define a sphere in 3 dimensions.)

2.3.4 NEED sheets of circles drawn on 1 cm × 1 cm You could divide up the work among the class
squared paper (containing circles of radius so that, perhaps in groups of 2 or 3, pupils work
6 cm/7 cm and 5 cm/8 cm). on a couple of different-sized circles. The
We’re looking for a connection between the teacher can collect all the results on the board
radius of a circle and its area. Count 1 cm2 (doing some kind of average of the results
squares (count the square if the circle covers people contribute, rejecting anything way out).
half or more of the square, otherwise ignore Someone could try the 3 cm, 4 cm and 9 cm
it). Make a table of the radius versus area and radius circles as well.
look for a pattern.
Calculated results (typically you get within a
Especially with the larger circles, it is sensible couple of cm2 experimentally):
to mark off a big square of 1 cm2 squares in the
middle of the circle and find its area by radius (cm) area (cm2)
multiplication, as that saves counting every 3 28.2
single 1 cm2. Then you can count the ones 4 50.2
round the edge and add the two amounts. 5 78.5
6 113.1
7 153.9
8 201.1
9 254.5
A clue to help with seeing the connection is to
square the radius numbers and then look for a
pattern. Make predictions and check.
Pupils can plot the results on a graph (area on Should get a parabola curve.
the vertical axis, radius on the horizontal).
Answer: the exact radius needed is
Using compasses and 1 cm × 1 cm squared
paper, try to draw a circle with an area of 100
= 5.64 cm.
exactly (or as near as you can) 100 cm2. Use π
the graph to decide what the radius ought to
be. Check by counting the squares.

2.3.5 NEED scissors, glue and 5 cm radius circles A circle this size produces a “rectangle” that fits
(draw with compasses). Cut out the circle and nicely on an approximately A5 exercise book
divide it roughly into sixteenths (8 lines), like page.
cutting up a cake. Cut along all the lines so
that you get 16 sectors of the circle.
Arrange them into an approximate This is more than an approximation, because
“rectangle/parallelogram”. we can imagine splitting up the circle into 32,
64, 128, etc. pieces; in fact, as many as we like,
1
2
c =πr so we can make a shape which is as close to a
rectangle/parallelogram as we like.

The more pieces we use, the more valid this

r argument becomes, so the area of the
parallelogram gets closer and closer to the true
area of the circle, so π r 2 must be the true area
of the circle.

So the area is π r × r = π r 2 .

2.3.6 Function machines are useful for managing See sheet.

conversions between A , r , d and c .
It’s easy to make up questions and put the
values into a table.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 29

 2.3.7 The Number π is a transcendental number (it All transcendental numbers are irrational.
doesn’t satisfy any polynomial equation with The opposite of transcendental is “algebraic”.
integer co-efficients). You can’t write it as a
fraction using integers (it’s irrational). The Other transcendental numbers include e , eπ ,
decimal digits go on for ever and never go 2
back to the beginning and repeat. Everyone’s ln 2 and 2 . No-one knows if ee , π π or π e
telephone number and credit card number is are transcendental.
in there somewhere! (It has not actually been
proved that the digits of π are “random” in the (See sheet for the first 10 000 or so digits of π –
sense that every possible combination of digits you can photocopy back-to-back onto card and
of a given length comes up equally often, but it pass around the room: pupils may try to find
is very probably true.) their phone numbers!)

Ways of Calculating π : 2. is the Maclaurin (1698-1746) series for

1. π2
= 1
+ 1
+ 1
+ 1
+ ... , but this converges tan −1 1 , but it is also called the Leibniz (1646-
6 12 22 32 42 1716) or Gregory (1638-1675) series.
very slowly (145 terms to get 2 dp);
2. π4 = 11 − 13 + 15 − 71 + 19 − ... , which also You could try these series on a spreadsheet.
converges slowly; There are many other ways of calculating π .
π4 To get a large number of digits, you need more
3. 90
= 1
+ 1
+ 1
+ 1
+ ... , which converges efficient processes than these.
14 24 34 44
quickly (only 3 terms to get 2 dp).
4. π = 2 × 12 × 32 × 43 × 54 × 56 × 76 × ... , called Wallis’ π is a letter in the Greek alphabet (does
anyone know Greek?). It has nothing to do with
product (John Wallis, 1616-1703). pies often being circular or pie charts or
Pythagoras’s Theorem!
Some pupils may find these interesting:
∞ − 12 x 2
e dx = 2π and eiπ + 1 = 0
−∞

2.3.8 Imagine a cable lying flat on the ground all the Answer:
way round the equator and back to where it Additional cable = 2π (r + 10) − 2π r which is just
started. If instead you wanted to support the 2π 10 = 62.8 m.
cable all the way round on poles 10 m high, Much less than people generally expect.
how much more cable would you need?
(We have to ignore the existence of the sea!) The radius of the earth doesn’t matter (it would
be the same extra amount putting cable 10 m
(You don’t need to know the radius of the around a 2p piece), because for a larger circle
earth, but it’s 6.4 × 106 m, and you can provide you need a smaller proportion of a bigger
it as unnecessary information if you like!) amount; for a smaller circle a bigger proportion
of a smaller amount.
An alternative version of this is the following
puzzle: A businessman sets out on a journey, He has been once round the equator and his
eventually returning to the place where he height is 2 m.
started. He claims that during his trip his head
has travelled 12.6 m further than his feet have.
How can that be possible?

2.3.9 Imagine a circular coin of radius r rolling Answer: p + 2π r units. (It follows the edges of
round the edge of a square with perimeter p the polygon but also, at each vertex, the centre
so that it never slips. How far does the centre moves in an arc. By the time it gets back to the
of the coin move when the coin goes round the beginning it’s turned through 360˚, and that’s
square once? where the extra 2π r comes from.)

What if you rolled the coin round a different Same result. The polygon doesn’t have to be
polygon (still with total perimeter p )? regular, although it does need to be convex.

What if you rolled it round an identical coin? Effectively, the same result, with p = 2π r , so the
total is 2π r + 2π r = 4π r units.
(The centre just moves round a circle with total
radius 2r , so you can calculate 2π (2r ) = 4π r ,
the same answer.)
30 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
2.3.10 Four large pipes, each of 1 m diameter, are Answer:
held tightly together by a metal band as There are four quarter-circle arcs (one on each
shown below. How long is the metal band? pipe) with a total length of 2π r = π and four
straight pieces with a total length of 4 × 2r = 4 ,
so the total length of the metal band is
4 + π metres = 7.14 m.

What if instead there are only three pipes? By the same argument, length = 3 + π m.

What if there are n pipes? For n pipes, n + π metres ( n > 1 ).

If n = 1 , it is just π metres.

2.3.11 (You can draw this reasonably well on a Answer:

squared whiteboard.) Pupils may guess that they’re the same,
Which shaded area is bigger (could use although many people think that the middle
different colours), the outer or the inner? three rings look bigger.
Area of the outer ring = π (52 − 42 )
= π 32 = area of first three rings.

If it were a “dartboard” it probably would be

easier to hit the middle three rings than the
outer one, because although the areas are the
same the outer one has a very thin width.
(Imagine trying to hit a 4 cm × 4 cm square; that
would be much easier than a 1 cm × 16 cm
rectangle, although they have equal areas.)

2.3.12 Imagine a circular sheet of metal of diameter Answer:

6 m. What percentage of the metal will be area used 2 × π (1.5) 2
wasted if you cut out two circles, each of = = 1
2
, so 50% is wasted.
diameter 3 m?
total area π 32
How many 2 m diameter circles can you cut
Answer: 7 circles is the maximum (see drawing
out of the original 6 m diameter sheet? What
on the left)
would be the percentage wasted this time?

area used 7 × π 12
With 2 m circles, = = 7
9
, so
total area π 32
2
only 9
or 22% is wasted now.

2.3.13 A washing machine has a drum of diameter Answer: There’s a total of 5 × 1100 = 5500
50 cm and spins clothes at 1100 rpm revolutions, each of which is a distance of
(revolutions per minute). How far do a pair of π d = 0.5 π = 1.6 m, so the total distance =
trousers travel if they are spun for 5 minutes? 5500 × 1.6 = 8.6 km!
(Assume they stick to the inside of the drum Speed = distance/time = 8.6/ 121 =
throughout.)
about 100 kph! (That’s why its good if the door
How fast are they going?
won’t open until it’s finished spinning!)

2.3.14 How many times do the wheels on a car go Answer:

round when the car travels 1 mile? Circumference = π d = 0.5 π = 1.6 m.
1 mile = 1.6 km, so number of rotations =
Assume a diameter of about 0.5 m. 1600/1.6 = 1000 times. (This assumes that the
wheel doesn’t slip at all on the ground.)

2.3.15 If a car has a turning circle (kerb-to-kerb) of Answer: about half as much, 5 m in this case,
10 m, estimate the size of the narrowest road because it can turn about 90° clockwise (viewed
in which it could perform a three-point-turn. from above) before reaching the kerb and then
(Turning circle means that on full lock at low reverse another 90° (still clockwise from above)
speed the car could just follow a circle of this before driving off.
diameter; i.e., the car could just manage a (This assumes that the driver switches from
U-turn in a street 10 m wide.) right-lock to left-lock very quickly.)
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 31
 Converting Area, Radius, Diameter
and Circumference of Circles

square
A ×π it r ×2 d ×π c

Using the triangles below, cover up the variable that you want to find, and you can “see” the
c
formula; e.g., d = , etc.
π
c A
π d π r2

Fill in the gaps in tables like this (choose where to leave out values). Vary the units.

r d c A
6 12 37.70 113.10
1 2 6.28 3.14
25 50 157.08 1963.50
14 28 87.96 615.75
7.4 14.8 46.50 172.03
11 22 69.12 380.13
28 56 175.93 2463.01
35.8 71.6 224.94 4026.39
254 508 1595.93 202682.99
5 10 31.42 78.54
42 84 263.89 5541.77
0.75 1.5 4.71 1.77

Earth, Sun, Satellites

earth’s mean radius: 6.4 × 106 m mean distance from earth to sun: 1.5 × 1011 m
height above earth’s surface of geostationary satellites: 3.6 × 107 m

Use this data to answer these questions.

1. How far does someone standing on the equator move in 24 hours?

First take account of the rotation of the earth.
Answer: 2π rearth = 40 000 km.
Then think about the earth’s movement round the sun.
2π rearth −to − sun
Answer: = 2.6 × 106 km
365

2. How fast does a geostationary satellite have to move in space?

A geostationary satellite is one which is always in the same position above the surface of
the earth as the earth rotates.
2π rearth −to − satellite
Answer: = 11 000 kph.
24
32 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
 Circles
Measure the circumference (use string, a strip of paper or a tape measure) and the
diameter of each circle.
Record your results in a table.
What do you notice?
Circumference: distance around the edge
Diameter: distance across the middle

g h

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 33

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17557829735233446042815126272037343146531977774160319906655418763979293344195215
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87040859133746414428227726346594704745878477872019277152807317679077071572134447
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88518529092854520116583934196562134914341595625865865570552690496520985803385072
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 7 cm
6 cm

36 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 5 cm
8 cm

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 37

2.4 Angles

• “Angle” can sometimes refer to a corner (vertex) or to the size of the angle at that vertex.
In diagrams we tend to use capital letters to represent points or sizes of angles and lower case letters
ˆ , ∠A , ∠ABC for angles and a , AB , for lengths.
to represent lengths of lines; e.g., A , Â , ABC , ABC
• Pupils may also need to know the conventional ways of indicating equal angles, equal lengths of lines
and parallel lines in diagrams. This is sometimes better covered when dealing with polygons (section
2.1).
• A full-circle protractor (0°-360°) is a lot more convenient than a semicircle (0°-180°) one, and it’s an
advantage if there is no area missing in the middle and there are continuous lines going out from the
centre to the numbers around the edge. Pupils also sometimes find a 360˚ protractor easier to hold
because of the lump at the centre. The reason for the two scales (clockwise and anticlockwise) may
need explaining.
• The convention that anticlockwise rotations are positive and clockwise negative is often used.
• Pupils can aim for an accuracy of ± 1°. A sharp pencil helps. Sometimes lines need extending on a
drawing to reach the fine scale around the edge of the protractor.
• Angles are revised in sections 2.5 and 2.6.

2.4.1 People maths. Review N, E, S, W (“Naughty Avoid embarrassing pupils who have difficulty
Elephants Squirt Water!”, or equivalent). distinguishing right and left.
Everybody stand up. Let’s say this way is “Right is the hand most people write with.”
north (or work it out or take a vote! West could The first finger and thumb of the left hand make
be the direction of the windows, etc.). an “L” shape when held out at 90°.
Which way is clockwise? Which way is right?
Turn 90° clockwise, turn 270° anticlockwise,
turn 450° clockwise, etc. Everyone does it at Establish that for 180° the direction doesn’t
the same time. matter.

Then try it mentally. Sit down. If I said turn If you started off facing North, you would be
270° anticlockwise and then 90° clockwise facing South.
which way would you be facing? (N, S, E, W?)

How much clockwise is equivalent to x ° Answer: (360 − x) °, if 0 ≤ x ≤ 360 , or more

anticlockwise? generally (360 − x mod 360) °.

Give me directions for getting from here to

Not allowed to draw anything or wave arms
the hall/dining room/head’s office, etc.
around. Imagine you were using the telephone.
2.4.2 NEED blindfold (clean tea-towels are
convenient), prize (e.g., chocolate bar).
Choose 2 volunteers, one who doesn’t mind
being blindfolded and blindfold that one. Obviously check they can’t see anything. Spin
Escort the blindfolded person to the back of round to lose orientation.
the room and rearrange the desks a little.
Place the prize somewhere. The blindfolded On a chair tucked under a table is quite
person has to get the chocolate bar without difficult.
touching anything except the floor with any
part of him/her. The other volunteer has to You could give them 3 “lives”.
give directions but isn’t allowed anywhere
near the blindfolded person.
Keep it open-ended and see what they do –
Keep close by in case the person falls. generally they’ll use left and right, but possibly
angles, especially near the end when small
movements are necessary.

38 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 2.4.3 Covering the special names for angles in The words horizontal (the same direction as the
particular ranges gives a good opportunity to horizon) and vertical might need revision.
review > and < or to introduce θ (does
anyone know Greek?) as a symbol often used These may be ways of adding interest to
to represent an angle (a bit like x standing for revision material.
a number in algebra).

• acute angles: 0 < θ < 90 ; The “angle facts” that the angles on a straight
• right angle (quarter turn): θ = 90 ; line add up to 180° and the angles at a point
• obtuse angles: 90 < θ < 180 ; add up to 360° are really just definitions of what
we count as “straight” and what we mean by
• straight line (half turn): θ = 180 ;
“all the way round” together with our choice of
• reflex angles: 180 < θ < 360 ; how many degrees to have in a full turn.
• full turn: θ = 360 .

Why do you think there are 360° in a full turn? Just a convention/historical accident;
apparently the Babylonians counted in 60’s
(base 60) instead of 10’s like we do.
We could measure in % (25% for a quarter We could use 2π (radians) or 400 (gradients)
turn, etc.) or “minutes” (15 min for a quarter or anything you like for a full turn.
turn).
2.4.4 Testing Angle Accuracy. Pupils may enjoy the chance to press the
Draw axes from 0 to 10 horizontally and 0 to 30 mysterious tan button on the calculator before
vertically. Must use the same scale (e.g., they learn about it in trigonometry.
0.5 cm for 1 unit) on both axes.
As accurately as possible, join (0,0) to (10,10). Answer: Should obviously be 45° because we’re
Measure the angle made by this line and the bisecting the 90˚ between the axes, but the
horizontal axis. calculator knows what it should be: make sure
you’re in degrees mode and do tan −1 1 .

Now join (0,0) to (10,20) and again measure Check with tan −1 2 = 63.43494882…°.
the angle this line makes with the horizontal
axis.
Finally (0,0) to (10,30). Check with tan −1 3 = 71.56505118…°.
Pupils may suspect that the line joining, say, Further points may be chosen if more practice
(0,0) to (10,25) would make an angle of is needed; this saves photocopying sheets of
tan −1 2.5 with the x -axis. random angles for pupils to measure, and
reviews co-ordinates at the same time. It may
also be more interesting.

2.4.5 What is an angle? It’s quite hard to explain; you can’t really say
(Imagine your little brother/sister wanted to “distance between”, etc.
know what your maths homework was about.) Need to talk about rotating or turning: “a way of
saying how much something has turned”.
Tell me a job in which you’d have to think flying a plane, footballer, plumber, roofer, TV
about angles? aerial fitter, maths teacher, etc.

2.4.6 Parallel and perpendicular logically crop up It isn’t enough to say that parallel lines are just
here, because parallel lines are straight lines lines the same distance apart because so are
going in the same direction (angle between the circumferences of concentric circles or
them = 0°) and perpendicular lines are lines railway tracks going round a bend. The lines
that are at 90° to each other. (Even if the lines also have to be straight.
go on for ever in both directions,
perpendicular lines don’t necessarily touch in Could discuss infinity. Do parallel lines ever
3 dimensions. Non-parallel non-intersecting meet? Not if they’re always a certain (non-zero)
lines are called skew lines.) distance apart. On a globe “parallel” lines of
longitude meet at the N and S poles.
Pupils may know from reflection and refraction
in science that “normal” means at 90° (the
angles of light rays are measured from lines
normal to the surfaces).
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 39
 2.4.7 Find out how much the Leaning Tower of Pisa Answer: about 10°, although it varies year by
leans (could do this for homework). year as it leans more and then engineers try to
straighten it a little.

2.4.8 NEED “Which Angles are Equal?” sheets, The intention is that pupils draw a circle (about
pencil crayons, protractors perhaps. 1 cm radius) at each of the 15 crossing points
and then using two colours shade vertically
This seems to work better than asking pupils to opposite angles the same colour. Equal angles
draw their own lines, because unless you’re at different crossing points should also be
careful there isn’t room to mark the angles coloured the same colour.
clearly. Have some spare copies because when
you’ve gone very wrong it’s hard to rescue!
Answer: 6, because there are 3 pairs of parallel
How many colours will you need? lines, and each can intersect any of the others –
and 3C2 = 3. Each intersection creates 2
different-sized angles, so altogether there will
be 6 different angles.

2.4.9 Angles associated with parallel lines. Vertically opposite angles (like scissors or a
Learning the names can be tedious. pair of pupils’ rulers, like letter X) – nothing to
First concentrate on identifying which angles do with a “vertical” direction, but angles
are equal to each other and which pairs of opposite at a “vertex” (= point).
angles sum to 180° (supplementary angles). Corresponding angles (in corresponding
If you have a rectangular whiteboard and a positions, like Chris and Katie, both at the end
metre stick (or pole for opening the windows) of a row in the classroom, like letter F).
you can easily lay the stick across parallel Alternate angles (opposite sides of the line that
sides of the board at different angles to show goes through the parallel pair of lines, like
what equals what; otherwise use a letter Z).
noticeboard or desk.
Interior angles – the odd ones out because
they’re not equal but they sum to 180° (like
letter C).

(Unfortunately “C-angles” are “interior” and

the “C” doesn’t stand for “corresponding”.)

Interior angles in polygons are just the inside

The line crossing a pair of parallel lines is angle at each vertex, and they sum to different
called a transversal. amounts depending on how many sides the
polygon has.

2.4.10 Clock Angles. Answers:

If you look at the minute and hour hands of a This smaller angle may be acute, right-angled
clock, there are two angles between them. or obtuse but never reflex.
I’m only interested in the smaller of the two
angles. 3.00 and 9.00. Other times are probably not
Tell me a time when the angle is 90°. exact.
Why is 12.15 not exactly correct? The hour hand will have moved a bit as well.
Will 12.15 be more or less than 90°? Less.
Tell me another time when the angle will be Less: 1.20, 2.25, 3.30, 4.35, 5.40, 6.45, etc.
just less than 90°?
When will it be just more? More: 4.05, 5.10, 6.15, 7.20, 8.25, 9.30, etc.
What will the angle be at 9.30? Hour hand will be half way between 9 and 10
(15° above the 9) so the angle is 90 + 15 = 105°.

Work out the (smaller) angle between the Answers:

hands at
1. 3.00 2. 11.00 3. 11.30 1. 90° 2. 30° 3. 165°
4. 3.30 5. 12.05 6. 4.45 4. 75° 5. 27.5° 6. 127.5°

(Pupils can do some of this mentally.) Make use of symmetry (3.30 will be the same
angle as 8.30 – not 9.30 – because it’s just a
reflection in a mirror).
40 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
2.4.11 The sum of the three interior angles in a Be sure that pupils don’t think you’re saying
triangle = 180°. “some of the angles in a triangle are 180˚ – and
NEED small paper triangles, one per pupil. some aren’t”!
Hand them out. Who’s got a nearly right-
angled triangle? Who’s got a nearly You can make these quickly and easily using
equilateral triangle?, etc. Hold it up. two or three sheets of coloured A4 paper and a
Class experiment – between us we’re trying guillotine. Make sure that there are a variety of
all sorts of triangles. acute-angled, obtuse-angled and right-angled
triangles.
Option 1: You can tear off the corners and
arrange the pieces next to one another to
make a straight line. Tearing is better than cutting because it’s easy
to see which corner is the angle that was
previously in the triangle.

Option 2 may be better if many pupils have

Option 2: Put the longest side horizontal done option 1 before.
(largest angle at the top) if you can tell, and
measure the lengths of the two shorter sides;
divide those lengths by two to find the mid-
points of those two shorter sides and mark
them. Join them with a ruler to give a line
parallel to the bottom side and fold the top
part down along this line (see diagram right).
Fold in the other two corners (vertical fold
lines) and all three angles should meet Note that neither option 1 nor option 2 is a
together and make 180°. proof, although they can be turned into proofs
by thinking about equal angles.

Dynamic Proof: Draw a “general” triangle on

the board and put a large cardboard arrow or
similar straight object (must have 3
distinguishable ends) in the middle of the
bottom side (see diagram right, 1).
We’re going to use the arrow to “add up”
angles.
Slide it to the left corner (no change in
direction so no angle yet) and rotate it to 2
“measure” the interior angle at that corner 1
(2). Slide it to the top corner, and, still rotating
anticlockwise, “add on” that corner angle
(actually the angle vertically opposite to it,
which is equal) (3). Slide it, without changing
direction, to the final (right) corner and “add
on” that angle (still anticlockwise), leaving the
arrow pointing 180° relative to its initial
position (1).
Work like this shows the dynamic aspect of
angles – they’re a measure of turning
(This is similar to the standard proof that the
movement.
exterior angles of any polygon add up to 360°
by walking around it.)

2.4.12 How many times in the course of 12 hours are Answer: 22 times
the hands of a clock at right angles to each Imagine starting and finishing at 12.00.
other? The hands will be at right angles twice in every
one hour period, except that we will count 3.00
and 9.00 twice (because they occur on the
Pupils can invent similar puzzles. hour), so we have to subtract those two.
24 – 2 = 22 times.
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 41
2.4.13 The hour hand and minute hand on an Answer: Can use simultaneous equations, even
analogue clock coincide at 12 noon. When is the concept of angular velocity, if you like.
the next time when they coincide exactly?
A neater way is to see first that the occasions
Hint: It won’t be exactly 1.05 pm. when the hands coincide will occur regularly.
Will it be before or after? (After) (At the 1.05-ish time, imagine rotating the
painted numbers so that it reads 12 noon again
If they coincide t hours after 1 o’clock, then – you could carry on like this.)
θ h = 30(t + 1) and θ m = 360t , so solving Since it will happen 11 times in 12 hours, each
simultaneously gives 30(t + 1) = 360t and so coincidence will occur after 1211
of an hour; i.e.,
t = 11
1
hour after 1 o’clock. at 1.05 and 27 secs, 2.10 and 55 secs, etc.

2.4.14 Triangles. Draw up a table like this (big There are two systems for naming triangles: by
enough to contain drawings): their angles or by the lengths of their sides.

scalene isosceles equilateral

acute- Note that “acute-angled” means all the angles
angled are acute, whereas “obtuse-angled” means
obtuse- only that there is one obtuse angle (more would
angled
be impossible – see section 2.4.15).
right-
angled
Answers:
For the top left square, if a triangle can be
Equilateral triangles must be acute-angled,
both scalene and acute-angled, draw an
because all the angles have to be 60°.
example. Put X if it’s impossible, and try to say
All other combinations are possible.
why. Complete the table.

2.4.15 What sorts of angles can a triangle have? Answers:

Here are some more specific questions. 1. yes, lots of examples;

If the answer is yes, make up an example and 2. no, because their total would be >180°;
draw or list the angles; if the answer is no, try 3. no, because their total would be >180°;
to explain why not. 4. yes, lots of examples;
5. no, because it would be >180°;
Can a triangle have (as interior angles) … 6. no, because their total would be 180° and
1. an obtuse angle? there needs to be a non-zero third angle;
2. two obtuse angles? 7. yes, lots of examples;
3. an obtuse angle and a right angle? 8. no, because although their total might be
4. an obtuse angle and an acute angle? 180° (e.g., 40˚, 45˚, 45˚, 50˚), a “tri-angle”
5. a reflex angle; has to have exactly 3 angles!
6. two right angles;
7. a right angle and an acute angle? Note that we are always talking about the
8. four acute angles? interior angles of the triangles.

2.4.16 I’m thinking of a triangle. Tell me how big its Answers:

angles are and what kind of triangle it is.
I’ll call the angles in each one A, B and C. 1. A = 30°, B = 60°, C = 90°;
scalene right-angled triangle;
1. Angle B is twice the size of angle A and 2. A = 90°, B = 45°, C = 45°;
angle C is three times the size of angle A; isosceles right-angled triangle;
2. Angle A is twice the size of angle B and 3. A = 20°, B = 40°, C = 120°;
angle C is the same size as angle B; scalene obtuse-angled triangle;
3. Angle B is twice the size of angle A and 4. A = 18°, B = 72°, C = 90°;
angle C is three times the size of angle B scalene right-angled triangle.
(not same as question 1);
4. Angle B is four times the size of angle A These can be solved by forming equations or by
and angle C is five times the size of angle trial and improvement or by “intuition”.
A.
Pupils can make up their own for each other.

42 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.4.17 Polygon Angles.
(“Interior” angles in polygons means something
different from “interior” angles formed when a Drawing polygons with various numbers of
straight line crosses a pair of parallel lines.) sides and measuring and summing the interior
angles of each tends to give very inaccurate
results, although it is a possible approach.

What do the angles inside a square add up to? Most will know/guess 360°.
What if I just draw any quadrilateral? Show how it can be split by a diagonal into two
(Keep it convex for now.) triangles. Colour the angles in one triangle red
and the other blue. What do the blue angles
add up to?, etc.

Use this trick of splitting into triangles to work If the polygon has n sides (and so n vertices),
out the total interior angle in polygons with this method will divide it into n − 2 triangles.
sides from 5 all the way up to 10. Choose one So the total interior angle = 180(n − 2) .
vertex and joining this to all the other vertices,
so dividing the polygon into triangles.
If the polygon happens to be regular, what In a regular polygon, the interior angles will be
can you say about each of the interior angles?
180(n − 2) 360
equal, so each will be = 180 − .
If the polygon contains one or more reflex n n
angles, this method of dissection into triangles no. of no. of total size of each
doesn’t work. sides triangles interior angle if
In that case, one or more points have to be angle polygon is
chosen inside the triangle and these joined to n n–2 regular
as many vertices as possible. In this way, the
3 1 180 60
polygon can always be divided into triangles,
and each additional internal “point” contributes 4 2 360 90
an extra 360° to the total angle, and this has to 5 3 540 108
be subtracted. 6 4 720 120
(The total interior angle for a concave polygon 7 5 900 128.6
like this is always the same as for a convex 8 6 1080 135
polygon with the same number of sides.) 9 7 1260 140
10 8 1440 144

Plot a graph of “size of one interior angle of a

regular n -gon” against n .
Make a prediction for n = 100 .
Why does this happen?

The graph gets closer and closer to 180° as the

number of sides the polygon has goes up.
(There is an asymptote at 180˚.)
When n = 100 , angle = 176.4°.
As the number of sides goes up, the polygon
looks more and more like a circle, and if you
zoom in on any part of the circumference of a
circle it looks almost like a straight line (180°
interior angle). Common-sense says the angle at each corner
will get bigger as the polygon gets more sides.
Mathematically, if θ is the angle, then
180(n − 2) 360 An alternative way to find the interior angle of a
θ= = 180 − , and as n gets larger
n n regular polygon is to begin with the exterior
360 angles (which sum to 360° for any polygon), so
and larger, gets smaller and smaller, so in a regular polygon each must be 360 .
n n
that θ increases, getting closer and closer to Therefore, since each exterior angle and
180°. interior angle together must make a straight
(As n → ∞, θ → 0 .) line, each interior angle must be equal to
360 180(n − 2)
180 − = .
n n

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 43

2.4.18 Exterior angles. exterior
NEED newspaper and scissors. angle
The “exterior angle” doesn’t mean all the
angle outside the shape at each vertex; it
means the change in direction at each vertex,
so that exterior angle + interior angle at each
vertex equals 180° (see diagram right).
(For a concave polygon, where the interior (Or you can go outdoors and use or draw with
angle at one or more vertices is a reflex angle, chalk a shape on the ground.)
we say that there is no exterior angle at that
vertex.) For this to work with a concave polygon we
Place sheets of newspaper on the floor and need to count the exterior angle where there is
imagine walking round it (start in the middle a reflex interior angle as negative, because at
of one of the sides). The total change in that corner we change from going clockwise to
direction is 4 × 90° = 360°. This will always going anticlockwise (or vice versa).
happen. (Cut the paper so that it makes a
more unusual polygon and do it again.) After With an equilateral triangle, the exterior angles
we’ve walked round the whole shape we’re are 120°. Exterior angles are important when
always pointing back in the same direction. doing LOGO programming (see section 3.8).

2.4.19 Any convex polygon with n sides can be split Answer:

up into n − 2 triangles. How many ways are n no. of ways n no. of ways
there of doing that? 3 1 8 132
4 2 9 429
5 5 10 1430
They fit the formula 6 14 11 4862
2n −4
Cn − 2 7 42 12 16796
number of ways = .
n −1
These are the Catalan numbers (Eugène
Catalan, 1814-1894).
For instance, for n = 6 you can have, e.g.,
It might seem that for n ≥ 5 there will just be n
ways, because n − 3 vertices can be joined to
each of the n vertices, but there are more than
this because the cuts need not all meet at one
point. For n ≥ 6 there are dissections like those
on the left.

2.4.20 Constructing and solving equations from Answer: 10 x = 180 , so x = 18 °, so the three
polygon and parallel line angles; angles are 36°, 54° and 90°.
e.g., a triangle has angles 2x , 3x and 5x ; how
much are they? It’s easy to make up this kind of thing or find
examples in books.

2.4.21 Angles in 3 dimensions. Answer: need to do a diagram or make a

Two diagonals are drawn on two adjacent model.
faces of a cube. If they meet at a vertex, what
angle do they make with each other?

People often go for complicated methods like

trigonometry or vectors, but particularly in
If you add in a third diagonal, you can see that
geometry there is often an easier and more
you get an equilateral triangle (all sides are the
elegant solution.
same length), so the interior angles are all 60°.

2.4.22 How much can an object lean without Answer: If the object is uniform (the same all the
toppling? For instance, a 3 × 1 × 1 cuboid way through), then its “centre of mass” will lie
brick standing on its end – what’s the steepest at the geometric centre. The object will be
slope it can balance on? stable if a vertical line going through the centre
For this brick, of mass passes within the base.
maximum angle of slope = tan −1 13 = 18.4 ˚. (We assume that there is plenty of friction so the
block won’t slide down the slope.)
44 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
 Which Angles are Equal?

• Use arrows to show which lines below are parallel to each other.
• Every time two lines cross each other, they create four angles.
There are 15 crossing points in the drawing below, so there are 60 angles.
Use colour to show which angles are the same size as each other.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 45

2.5 Bearings

• There are three rules of bearings: always measure from north;

always measure clockwise;
always give 3 digits.
(If there’s someone in the class who does orienteering, you could ask him/her (in advance) to bring a
compass and teach the class how bearings work.)
Sometimes you have to draw in a north line at the point you’re measuring the bearing from.
• A full-circle protractor (0°-360°) is a lot more convenient than a semicircle (0°-180°) one, and it’s an
advantage if there is no area missing in the middle and there are continuous lines going out from the
centre to the numbers around the edge. Pupils also sometimes find a 360˚ protractor easier to hold
because of the lump at the centre. The reason for the two scales (clockwise and anticlockwise) may
need explaining.
• Pupils can aim for an accuracy of ± 1° and ± 1 mm. A sharp pencil helps. Sometimes lines need
extending on a drawing to reach the fine scale around the edge of the protractor.
• Local maps are usually much more interesting than remote or invented ones in textbooks.
(You could ask the Geography department if you can borrow some local maps.)

2.5.1 NEED A4 plain paper. Fits nicely on A4 paper.

Coastguard Stations.
Facing the class, pick a pupil at your front left. (The drawing below is the right way round for
“Beth is a coastguard station. Ashley (front the class.)
right) is another coastguard station. And Sally
(somewhere in the middle of the room) is a
sinking ship!”
On the board, begin a drawing (see right). A B

Sally radios in to Ashley and to Beth to say that

she’s sinking – send help! But her GPS is
broken and she doesn’t know where she is. S
And by the way it’s night time and foggy.

A and B measure the directions they receive

Sally’s message from. (GPS = Global Positioning System – a very
from A from B accurate way of telling where you are that uses
Ship 157° 213° satellites.)

The coastguard stations are 16 km apart, so

draw a line at the top of the page (portrait
orientation) 16 cm long (the scale is 1 cm to
1 km). We’ll take north as up the page.
Do a scale drawing to find out how far away S
is from A and B. This is called triangulation.

A helicopter radios in to go and rescue S.

Answers:
from A from B from A from B
Helicopter 103° 244° Ship 16.2 km 17.8 km
Helicopter 11.1 km 5.7 km
Find where the helicopter is and work out how
far the helicopter has to go and on what Message to helicopter: “Travel 13.2 km on a
bearing to pick up Sally. bearing of 200° to intercept the ship.”

(Although this scenario is not completely (All of this assumes that the ship is stationary.)
realistic, pupils generally realise that but enjoy
it anyway.)
46 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
 2.5.2 NEED “Crack the code” sheets, protractors. Answer:
The message is “Always give three digits!”
The key is as follows.
Pupils can make up their own messages for
each other using the same code. A 243 B 016 C 260 D 314
E 148 F 234 G 306 H 072
I 209 J 167 K 096 L 056
M 036 N 124 O 105 P 278
Q 224 R 029 S 183 T 332
(“Remember I know the code so don’t say U 251 V 291 W 346 X 196
anything you wouldn’t want me to read!”) Y Z
269 133
2.5.3 What is the connection between the bearing of Answer:
A from B and the bearing of B from A? If the bearing of A from B is θ , then the bearing
Can you write a rule that works for any of B from A is
bearing ≥ 000° and < 360°? θ + 180 if 0 ≤ θ < 180 , and
θ − 180 if 180 ≤ θ < 360 .
Or you can say (θ + 180) mod 360 .

2.5.4 How could this happen? Answer: I must have started and finished at the
I take off in my aeroplane and head South. I North pole; the middle leg of the journey was
turn 90° to the left and head East. After a along the equator.
while, I turn 90° to the left again and head
North, and without changing direction again, I A globe or someone’s football makes this clear.
land back where I started. When you think about angles on a sphere,
you’re doing non-Euclidean geometry
Euclid (about 330-270 BC) wrote “Elements”. (although all the North lines are going in the
same direction, they meet – at the North pole).
The sum of the angles in a triangle on a sphere
(a “spherical triangle”) comes to more than (People sometimes think that the answer is the
180°, more the larger the triangle. Very small inside of a sphere, because it curves away from
triangles behave more or less Euclidean. you instead of towards you, but imagine that
What kind of surface would have the sum of the the sphere was made of glass – it’s actually the
angles in a triangle <180°? same triangle on both sides.)
The answer is to do with hyperbolic geometry –
Triangles behave “normally” on the surface of a you need a surface with “negative curvature”;
cylinder. You can unroll a surface like this into a e.g., a bicycle saddle.
flat sheet; it has no “intrinsic curvature”.

2.5.5 NEED maps of the local area; an A4 portion Depending on how wide your catchment area
should be enough (you could ask the is, you may want about 3.5 inches to a mile or
Geography department if there are some you 1.25 inches to a mile so as to include most of the
could borrow). places where pupils live or go.
Find the school, draw in a North line there,
and work out the bearings off all the major
places from the school.
Record the values in a table (place in one
column, bearing in another).

2.5.6 Treasure Map. If pupils are likely to spend a long time drawing
Make one, perhaps for an island, mark on the the island and its hazards and not much time
starting point and mark faintly in pencil an X working out bearings, you could insist that they
where the treasure is. Draw on dangers mark the safe route as they draw in the dangers
(swamps, man-eating tigers, sharks, and work out the bearings and instructions as
dangerous rocks, cliffs, etc.), but make sure they go along, rather than leaving that until the
there’s a safe route from the starting point to end!
the treasure. Decide which direction is North,
mark that on, and put a scale (say 1 cm = 1 m). Pupils could do the route on a second (thin)
On a separate sheet list instructions using piece of paper laid on top and remove it at the
bearings for getting safely to the treasure; end.
e.g., “Go 5 m on a bearing of 045°, then go
…”. See if someone else can follow your route.
Rub out the X thoroughly afterwards!
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 47
 2.5.7 What methods are there for finding where Answers: (some possibilities)
North is? What are the advantages and • compass (simple, but only works if you have
disadvantages of each? one handy and aren’t too near anything with
a strong magnetic field);
• use a map (or local knowledge) and a
landmark;
• point the minute hand of an analogue watch
at the sun, and bisect the angle between it
and the hour hand (don’t need special
equipment, but only works if you can see the
sun);
• find the North Star (need to know how to
locate it, have to be able to see the stars);
• global positioning system (very accurate,
but obviously you need to have one, and this
was no good before they were invented!).

2.5.8 NEED “Fancy Fields” sheets. Answers:

An opportunity to review polygon names and A rectangle B equil. triangle
scale drawing. C regular hexagon D square
E isos. r-angled tri F isos. trapezium
G parallelogram H regular octagon
2.5.9 Plot these points and work out the bearings of This could be done by measuring accurately or
the first from the second. by calculating using trigonometry and angle
Take the y -axis as North. facts.

1. (2,3) from (0,0) Answers:

2. (4,4) from (0,0)
3. (–2,5) from (0,0) 1 034° 2 045°
4. (6,–1) from (0,0) 3 338° 4 099°
5. (–2,–1) from (0,0) 5 243° 6 117°
6. (3,0) from (1,1) 7 243° 8 243°
7. (3,1) from (5,2) 9 315° 10 129°
8. (–4,–1) from (0,1)
9. (–5,3) from (–2,0)
10. (3,–5) from (–2,–1)

Why are the answers to three of the questions The lines in questions 5, 7 and 8 all have the
the same? same gradient (0.5) and direction (they’re the
same vectors).

2.5.10 Which way does an easterly wind go? Answer: An “easterly wind” usually means from
the east; i.e., heading west, whereas an
“easterly current” goes to the east (from the
On a map, “northings” run east-west and west).
“eastings” run north-south.
For this reason, it’s generally clearer to
describe the direction it’s coming from or going
to explicitly.

2.5.11 In some religions, people face in a particular Answer: Some Jewish, Christian and Muslim
direction to pray. Find out more about this. groups pray facing East. This may have had
something to do with the sun rising in the East,
or the Garden of Eden being planted “in the
East” (Genesis 2:8) or with many believers
living to the west of the “Holy Land”. Some Jews
This would theoretically be impossible if you face Jerusalem from wherever they are along
were either at Jerusalem/Mecca or on the exact the direction of a Great Circle, and Muslims
opposite side of the world from there (on a ship face Mecca by a similar method.
in the middle of the Pacific Ocean!).

48 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Crack the Code (Bearings) Crack the Code (Bearings)
Follow the bearings to find the letters. Follow the bearings to find the letters.
What is the message? What is the message?

W North W North
B B
T R T R
M M
D D
G G
L L

V V
H H

P P

Y Y
K K
C C
O O
U U
A A

F N F N
Z Z
Q Q

I E I E
X S J X S J

243° 056° 346° 243° 269° 183° 306° 209° 291° 148° 332° 243° 056° 346° 243° 269° 183° 306° 209° 291° 148° 332°

072° 029° 148° 148° 314° 209° 306° 209° 332° 183° 072° 029° 148° 148° 314° 209° 306° 209° 332° 183°
 Fancy Fields
I have eight interesting-shaped fields on my land.
I have walked around the perimeter of each of them recording the bearings and
distances for each of the sides.
Look at my data and try to say what shape each field is.
Then do an accurate drawing for each one to see if you are right.
Use a scale of 1 cm representing 100 m.

Field A Field B
A bearing of 000° for 400 m; A bearing of 000° for 400 m;
then a bearing of 090° for 800 m; then a bearing of 120° for 400 m;
then a bearing of 180° for 400 m; and finally a bearing of 240° for 400 m.
and finally a bearing of 270° for 800 m.

Field C Field D
A bearing of 090° for 500 m; A bearing of 045° for 600 m;
then a bearing of 150° for 500 m; then a bearing of 135° for 600 m;
then a bearing of 210° for 500 m; then a bearing of 225° for 600 m;
then a bearing of 270° for 500 m; and finally a bearing of 315° for 600 m.
then a bearing of 330° for 500 m;
and finally a bearing of 030° for 500 m.

Field E Field F
A bearing of 000° for 400 m; A bearing of 037° for 500 m;
then a bearing of 135° for 566 m; then a bearing of 090° for 500 m;
and finally a bearing of 270° for 400 m. then a bearing of 143° for 500 m;
and finally a bearing of 270° for 1100 m.

Field G Field H
A bearing of 090° for 600 m; A bearing of 135° for 400 m;
then a bearing of 220° for 400 m; then a bearing of 090° for 400 m;
then a bearing of 270° for 600 m; then a bearing of 045° for 400 m;
and finally a bearing of 040° for 400 m. then a bearing of 000° for 400 m;
then a bearing of 315° for 400 m;
then a bearing of 270° for 400 m;
then a bearing of 225° for 400 m;
and finally a bearing of 180° for 400 m.

Extra Task Design some fields of your own and work out instructions (using bearings
and distance) for placing the fence around the edge.

50 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.6 Trigonometry

• A topic that builds heavily on many others: ratio, similarity and enlargement, angles and lengths,
calculator use, rearranging formulas, Pythagoras’ Theorem, rounding to dp or sf.
• SOHCAHTOA is a common and not too difficult mnemonic. But some people prefer a whole sentence;
e.g., “Several Old Horses Cart Away Happily Tonnes Of Apples.” Pupils may remember them better if
they invent their own and make them funny.
A convenient way for using SOHCAHTOA is as three formula triangles (below); these can be written
at the top of a page of trigonometry work. Each formula triangle has one of A , O or H missing, so
we ask “What aren’t we interested in?” Let’s say we don’t know the adjacent side and we don’t need
to work it out, so we want the formula without A in it; therefore sin , the first triangle formula.
Then decide whether we need the opposite side, the hypotenuse or the angle, and write down a
formula for opp , hyp or sin x from the first triangle formula.

O A O
S H C H T A

These work by covering over the variable you want to reveal the formula for it.
opp opp
(If you cover S , you can see sin x = ; cover H and you can see hyp = , and cover O and you
hyp sin x
can see S and H next to each other, so opp = sin x × hyp . Similarly for the other formula triangles.)
• Pupils can get into a habit of putting all the information onto a clear drawing and labelling the three
sides with hyp , opp and adj before they start any calculations.
• Remind pupils to have calculators in the correct mode (degrees or radians). Sometimes the simplest
way to sort out a messed-up calculator is to use a biro to press the “reset” button on the back.

2.6.1 NEED “Trigonometry Investigation” sheets. This task takes advantage of the fact that tan 35
Clearly all the triangles are similar is very close to 0.7 (actually 0.7002075…).
(enlargements of one another), and any ratio
of corresponding sides like this should be Approximate results:
equal.
opp adj opp/adj
(mm) (mm) (2 dp)
You can also measure hyp and calculate the a 35 50 0.70
sin and cos ratios. b 63 90 0.70
( sin 35 = 0.57 and cos 35 = 0.82 , each to 2 dp.) c 73 105 0.70
d 46 65 0.71
e 32 45 0.71

2.6.2 You could begin the topic by investigating the

“mysterious” sin , cos and tan buttons on the
calculator.
They are functions that convert an angle in
degrees (make sure they’re in degrees mode)
into a number.
What’s the biggest number you can make sin 1, –1 ( sin values are always between 1 and –1).
give you?
What’s the smallest?
What’s it got to do with a right-angled triangle Pupils can experiment with the functions to see
that has that size angle as one of its angles? what happens.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 51

 2.6.3 Plot graphs of sin x , cos x and tan x against x Things to spot include these:
and discuss their properties. • sin x and cos x are both sinusoidal in shape
Plot values for 0° ≤ θ ≤ 720° , say. and periodic functions with the same period
What do you notice? of 360°; cos x is just 90° ahead of sin x
(called a “phase shift”).
Key values of the functions at 0°, 30°, 45°, 90°, • They both take values between – 1 and 1
etc. can be noted (see sheet). (“amplitude” = 1).
• tan x is different in having a period of only
You could discuss the fact that sinusoidal 180° and in taking all values from −∞ to ∞ .
graphs turn up in science; e.g., alternating It is also a discontinuous graph, with vertical
current/voltage; electric/magnetic fields in asymptotes at ±90° , ±270° , etc.
electromagnetic waves (e.g., light); the sound • cos x is an even function, symmetrical about
wave of a tuning fork is nearly sinusoidal.
the vertical axis ( cos(− x) = cos x ), whereas
Fourier Analysis (Jean Baptiste Fourier, 1768- sin x and tan x are odd functions, having
1830) is a way of building up a waveform by rotational symmetry of order 2 about the
adding together sinusoidal waves of different origin ( sin(− x) = − sin x and
amplitudes and frequencies. tan(− x ) = − tan x ).

2.6.4 Snell’s Law in Science Answers:

(Willebrord Snell, 1580-1626). Angles are measured from the normal (a line
When a beam of light travels from one perpendicular to the boundary).
medium to another, the angle of refraction r
(in the second medium) is related to the angle For n = 1.5 , r increases less quickly than i , and
of incidence i (in the first medium) by Snell’s when i reaches its maximum value of 90°,
Law, sin r =
sin i
, where the constant of r = sin −1 ( 1n ) = 41.8° , the so-called “critical
n angle” for glass-air.
proportionality n is the refractive index.
For n = 23 , r increases more quickly than i ,
Plot r against i for a couple of different and this time when i reaches the critical value
values of n ; e.g., n = 1.5 (for light going from of 41.8°, i no longer has any value (because
air into glass) and n = 1.5
1
= 23 (for light going sin can never be >1). This corresponds to the
light beam not being refracted at all: “total
from glass into air). internal reflection” takes place.
For air and water the values are
air nwater = 3 (air to water) and water nair = 4 .
4 3
For water-air, the critical angle is 48.6°.

2.6.5 Converting gradients into angles. Answers:

We already know that the line y = x (gradient y = 2 x makes an angle of tan −1 2 = 63.4°.
of 1) makes an angle of 45° with the x-axis.
y = mx makes an angle of tan −1 m , and if you
What is the angle that the line y = 2 x makes?
count a negative angle as a clockwise turn, then
this works even when m is negative.

2.6.6 NEED Old-fashioned trigonometrical tables. Answer:

You could explain how hard life was in the old They use power series such as
days (!) or how clever calculators are today x3 x5 x7
being able to work out sin , cos and tan so sin x = x − + − + … in radians.
3! 5! 7!
quickly. Pupils could try to find out for
Taking enough terms, you can get an answer as
homework how the calculator does it.
accurately as you like. (You first have to convert
the angle from degrees.)
Pupils can try this out for themselves on a
spreadsheet. Can you beat the calculator by
finding the next decimal place after the last
Spreadsheets can handle more decimal places
one the calculator shows?
than most calculators.
2.6.7 Assuming that the Leaning Tower of Pisa leans Answer: 55 tan10 = 9.7 m.
at an angle of 10° and is 55 m high, how far
does the top lean out over the bottom?

52 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 2.6.8 Approximating π from regular polygons.
Two approaches (see below and right):
1. Area: 2. Perimeter and Circumference:
π is the area of a unit circle (a circle of radius 2π is the circumference of a unit circle, so we
1) and we can approximate that area by can approximate that length by finding the
finding regular polygons that just fit into the perimeters of regular polygons that just fit into
unit circle and just fit outside the unit circle and outside the unit circle; i.e., the same
and working out their areas. regular polygons as used on the left.
Start with squares.

Here, the outer square has perimeter 4 × 2 = 8

units and the inner square has perimeter
The outer square has area 2 × 2 = 4 sq units.
The inner square has area 4 × 12 × 1× 1 = 2 sq 4 × 2 = 5.66 units, using Pythagoras’
Theorem.
units (by dividing it up into four triangles). So 5.66 < 2π < 8 , so 2.83 < π < 4 , giving a
So this gives 2 < π < 4 (not a very good different (slightly better) approximation from
approximation, but it’s a start!). that on the left.
Next try regular pentagons, and so on.
The pentagons can be divided into 5
congruent isosceles triangles by joining each
vertex to the centre of the circle. Each of these
triangles can be cut in half to give two
congruent right-angled triangles.
For the pentagon inside the circle, we have

1
sin 36

36° Using the same drawing as on the left, we

cos 36 have total perimeter of the pentagon inside
the circle = 5 × 2sin 36 = 10sin 36 .
so total area = 10 × 12 cos 36sin 36 =
5cos 36sin 36 .
For the pentagon outside the circle, we have

And total perimeter of the pentagon outside

tan 36 the circle = 5 × 2 tan 36 = 10 tan 36 .
36° This gives 10sin 36 < 2π < 10 tan 36 or
1 5sin 36 < π < 5 tan 36 , giving 2.94< π <3.63.
so total area = 10 × 12 tan 36 = 5 tan 36 . In general, for an n-sided polygon we obtain
So now 5sin 36 cos 36 < π < 5 tan 36 , giving 180 180
2.38< π <3.63, a better approximation. n sin < π < n tan , so putting n = 100
n n
gives 3.1411< π <3.1426.
In general, for an n-sided polygon we obtain
180 180 180
n sin cos < π < n tan , so Using perimeters of regular polygons gives a
n n n narrower approximation for π for a given
putting in n = 100 gives 3.1395< π <3.1426, value of n than using areas.
and taking n = 100 000 gives π as accurately
as can be displayed on a calculator. This method is interesting, but using a
calculator to find values of sin , cos and tan
isn’t really valid because the calculator uses its
value of π to work out them out!
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 53
 2.6.9 Rabbit Run. An investigation involving similar The rectangular case is an investigation in
work to the above approximating π methods. section 2.2.7.
I want to make a rabbit run area in my garden As shown there, there are 6 rectangles with
and I want to make the area as large as integer sides and perimeter 24 m.
possible. (My garden is very big.) I have 24 rectangle area rectangle area
metres of plastic fencing and I want to know 1 × 11 11 2 × 10 20
what shape run will enclose the maximum 3×9 27 4×8 32
possible area. 5×7 35 6×6 36
Start with rectangular runs. The one which encloses the maximum area is
the square one (6 × 6).

What if you set up the run (still rectangular) Answer: best option is a 6 × 12 run.
against the garden fence (then the fencing has (The function A = x(24 − 2 x) has its maximum
to go round only three sides)? value when x = 6 ; could draw a graph.)

What if you use the corner of the garden, so Answer: best option this time is a 12 × 12 run.
that the run (still rectangular) only has to have (The function A = (12 + x)(12 − x) has its
fencing on two of the sides? maximum value when x = 0 .)

What if you are allowed to make any shape For an n -sided regular polygon in the middle
run you like. Which will enclose maximum of the garden, we can put a point in the centre
area? and join it to each of the vertices to obtain n
Start in the middle of the garden (away from congruent isosceles triangles. We can divide
the garden fence) and find the best shape. each of these into two congruent right-angled
Then try it next to the fence. triangles (below).

180
angle = n 12
n

12
n 12
We can work out that x = = , so
tan 180
n
n tan 180
n
the total area of the polygon ( 2n of these right-
12
Using the garden fence as just one of the sides, angled triangles) is 2n × 12 x = 12x
n
a semicircle would be best. The curved portion
would have length 24 m, so the run would be 12 × 12 144
= = .
half of a circle of circumference 48 m, so the n tan 180
n
n tan 180
n
radius would be 248π = 7.64 m, and the area As n gets larger and larger, this area gets
closer and closer to the area of a circle with
would be 1
2
r 2π = 91.67 m2. circumference of 24 m.
By using the corner of the garden you could do Radius = 224π = 3.82 m, so area = r 2π = 45.84 m2.
even better. The run would be a quadrant, the
The isoperimetric theorem says that a circle
radius would be 42×π24 = 15.28 m and the area
encloses the maximum possible area for a given
would be 1
4
r 2π = 183.35 m2. perimeter. (This is why soap bubbles are
spherical.)

2.6.10 NEED various equipment. Trigonome-tree! Could estimate the volume of the tree and
Calculate the height of a tree in the school perhaps estimate how many paper towels (from
grounds (or nearby) using a clinometer school toilets) could be made from one tree.
(a device for measuring angle of elevation –
you can make a reasonable one by sticking a Choose a reasonably tall and thick tree. Assume
protractor onto a piece of cardboard and it is cylindrical (or conical) and measure the
using a ruler as the rotating portion). circumference with a tape measure.

54 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.6.11 True or false? Try them with angles. Answers:
1. sin( x + y ) = sin x + sin y 1. False unless x or y = 0 °, 360°, etc.;
2. sin 2 x = 2sin x 2. False unless x = 0 °, 360°, etc.;
3. sin 2 x = 2sin x cos x 3. Always true;
4. sin(90 − x) = sin x 4. False unless x = 45 °, 225°, etc.;
5. Always true.
5. sin(180 − x) = sin x
… and similar with cos and tan .
Make up some more like these.
Try to prove those that are true by using
graphs of the functions.

2.6.12 Trigonometry Facts and Formulas (see

sheets).

2.6.13 Methane (CH4) is a tetrahedral molecule. Answer: 109.5° (see sheet)

The carbon atom is surrounded by four (This is a very well-known value among
hydrogen atoms that get as far away from chemists, although few could calculate it
each other as they can while staying the same geometrically!)
distance from the carbon atom.
Calculate the H-C-H bond angle. You can imagine the hydrogens on the surface
of a sphere with its centre at the carbon.
If one or more of the H’s are replaced by a
Could use molecular models (science dept.). different atom, the bond angles won’t all be
exactly equal any more (unless all four H’s are
You could use vectors to solve this problem. replaced; e.g., in tetrachloromethane, CCl4).

2.6.14 Find out in which Sherlock Holmes story the Answer: “The Adventure of The Musgrave
detective has to use trigonometry to solve the Ritual” from “The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes”
mystery. by Arthur Conan Doyle.

He really just uses similar triangles. “If a rod of

6 feet threw a shadow of 9 feet, a tree of 64 feet
would throw one of 96 feet.” This enables him
to locate some hidden treasure and solve the
case.

2.6.15 Cinema/Theatre Seats. Answer:

What is the optimum slope of the floor in a average eye-to-top-of-head distance
cinema or theatre so that everyone can see tan −1
average thigh-to-knee distance
over the heads of the people in front?
If you imagine someone sitting directly behind
You could discuss the way that these sorts of
another person, their eyes need to be above the
calculations using “averages” across the
top of the head of the person in front.
population can fail to satisfy anyone: seats
The seat needs to go back at least as far as the
designed for an “average” person may be
distance from their knee to the top of their leg.
uncomfortable for almost everyone.
You could estimate how awkward it might be
Putting in estimates for these gives an angle of
for someone who is very tall or very short.
Who would be worse off? 15
about tan −1 = 14 ˚ approximately.
60

Of course, this won’t work if the person in front

is wearing a hat!

Estimate the maximum slope that you think

would be safe, bearing in mind that the floor This is quite a steep slope to walk up: you
will get wet when it’s raining outside. would be unlikely to want to go as steep as 20˚.
What about someone using a wheelchair? It may not be convenient for wheelchair users.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 55

 Trigonometry Investigation
Label the sides of these right-angled triangles with
hyp – hypotenuse (the side opp – opposite (the side adj – adjacent (the side next
opposite the right-angle) opposite the 35° angle) to the 35° angle)
Then measure the opp and adj sides with a ruler (to the nearest mm) and complete the table
below.
What do you notice?

a
b

35°

35°

35°

35°
35°

length of side opposite to length of side adjacent to opposite side

triangle the 35° angle the 35° angle adjacent side
(mm, to nearest integer) (mm, to nearest integer) (to 2 decimal places)
a
b
c
d
e

56 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Trigonometry Facts
LEARN EVERYTHING ON THIS PAGE. LEARN EVERYTHING ON THIS PAGE. LEARN EVERYTHING ON THIS PAGE.
Definitions Exact Values
SOHCAHTOA gives the meaning of sin x , cos x and tan x . The properties of equilateral and right-angled isosceles triangles
give these exact values of sin x , cos x and tan x .
Just remember the other three as
Use them whenever possible so that your answers are exact.
1 1 1
cot x = , sec x = and cosec x = . π π π π
tan x cos x sin x 0° = 0 30° = 6 45° = 4 60° = 3 90° = 2
1 2 3
sin x 0 2 2 2 1
(the s and the c go together – sec with cos and cosec with sin)
3 2 1
cos x 1 2 2 2 0
Imagine a right-angled triangle with a hypotenuse of 1 and an
3
angle x . tan x 0 3 1 3 ±∞
Using SOHCAHTOA, the shorter sides are cos x and sin x .
Notice that sin x = cos(90 − x) and cos x = sin(90 − x) .
sin x
So tan x ≡ ,
1 cos x Graphs
sin x
and by Pythagoras, When you’re solving trig equations, finding solutions within a
x certain range of angles, always draw one of these graphs.
cos x
sin 2 x + cos 2 x ≡ 1 . sin x cos x tan x
Dividing by sin 2 x gives 1 + cot 2 x ≡ cosec 2 x , and
dividing by cos 2 x gives tan 2 x + 1 ≡ sec 2 x .

Radians x x x
90 180 270 360 90 180 270 360 90 180 270
Always use them for angles unless the context specifically uses
degrees. Calculus will work only in radians.
360° = 2π , 180° = π , 90° = π2 , 45° = π4 , etc.
(the 3 and the 6 go together in 30° = π6 and 60° = π3 ) sin x and cos x vary between 1 and –1 with a period of 360°.
tan x can take any value and has a period of 180°.
Make sure your calculator is in the right mode!
Use the symmetry of these graphs to find multiple solutions.
 Trigonometry Formulas
Compound Angle Formulas These are the most important ones – you must
learn them.
sin( A + B) ≡ sin A cos B + cos A sin B
sin( A − B) ≡ sin A cos B − cos A sin B “sin,cos plus cos,sin”
cos( A + B ) ≡ cos A cos B − sin A sin B
“cos,cos minus sin,sin”
cos( A − B ) ≡ cos A cos B + sin A sin B
tan A + tan B
tan( A + B) ≡ Remember the minus in the ( A + B ) formulas
1 − tan A tan B
tan A − tan B for cos and tan .
tan( A − B) ≡
1 + tan A tan B

Double Angle Formulas These come from letting B = A in the above.

sin 2 A ≡ 2sin A cos A
cos 2 A ≡ cos 2 A − sin 2 A
These are also worth learning separately
2 tan A because they’re so useful.
tan 2 A ≡
1 − tan 2 A

Formulas Using Double Angles These come from combining the double angle
formulas with the identity sin 2 A + cos 2 A ≡ 1 .
cos 2 A ≡ 2 cos 2 A − 1
cos 2 A ≡ 12 (1 + cos 2 A) You could work these out (or look them up)
when you need them, but you need to know
cos 2 A ≡ 1 − 2sin 2 A that they exist.
sin 2 A ≡ 12 (1 − cos 2 A)

Factor Formulas

A+ B A− B
sin A + sin B ≡ 2sin cos These are very useful, and you certainly don’t
2 2
want to have to work them out.
A+ B A− B Either learn them or rely on looking them up
sin A − sin B ≡ 2 cos sin
2 2 when you need them.
A+ B A− B
cos A + cos B ≡ 2 cos cos
2 2
A+ B A− B
cos A − cos B ≡ −2sin sin Remember the “minus sin s” in the last one.
2 2

a , b and c are the lengths of the sides;

Formulas for Triangles
A , B and C the angles opposite the 3 sides.
a b c This is the Sine Rule.
= = = 2r
sin A sin B sin C r is the radius of the circumscribed circle.

a 2 = b 2 + c 2 − 2bc cos A This is the Cosine Rule.

area = 12 ab sin C = s( s − a)( s − b)( s − c) s is the semi-perimeter = 12 (a + b + c) .

58 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Calculating the H-C-H bond angle in Methane (CH4)
(Uses Pythagoras’ Theorem)

Imagine a tetrahedron ABCD with unit edge length and a hydrogen atom at each of the
vertices. (In the diagram below, ABD is the base.)
The position O is the location of the carbon atom, and is equidistant from each of the vertices.
We wish to find angle AOB.
C

O D

X
A
B

First we can find AX.

Looking from above, X is just the centre of the bottom equilateral triangle, so using
trigonometry in this triangle we find that AX = 12 ÷ cos 30 = 13 .

Now the total height of the tetrahedron, CX, is a shorter side of the right-angled triangle ACX,

( )
2
so using Pythagoras’ Theorem we find that CX = AC 2 − AX 2 = 1 − 1
3
= 2
3 .

We next find the C-H bond length l , which is equal to OA or OC.

Using Pythagoras’ Theorem in triangle OAX we have
OA2 = AX 2 + OX 2
= AX 2 + (CX − OC ) 2
= 13 + CX 2 − 2 × CX × OC + OC 2
l 2 = 13 + 32 − 2 2
3 l + l2
So 2 2
3 l = 1 and so l = 3
8 .
(Subtracting l 2 from both sides is OK here.)

Finally we use the cosine rule in triangle OAB to find angle AOB.
OA2 + OB 2 − AB 2
cos AOB =
2 × OA × OB
2l − 12 2 ( 83 ) − 1 − 14
2
= = = 3 = − 13
2l 2
2( 8 )
3
4

So angle AOB = cos −1 (− 13 ) = 109.47 °.

There are other ways of arriving at the value of this angle.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 59

2.7 Pythagoras’ Theorem

• You could say that this is really “Trigonometry” because it’s to do with solving triangles.
• It’s a good opportunity to revise circles, because there are so many good problems applying
Pythagoras’ theorem to circles, arcs, spheres, etc. (see later).
• Hypotenuse is the side opposite the right-angle. This may be a better definition than “the longest
side”, because this way it’s clear that there isn’t one in a non-right-angled triangle – any scalene
triangle and some isosceles triangles will have a “longest” side.)
• Instead of writing a 2 + b 2 = c 2 or a 2 = b 2 + c 2 and having to remember which letter is the hypotenuse,
pupils could write it as hyp 2 = a 2 + b 2 .
• The converse of Pythagoras is sometimes omitted, but provides a good opportunity to discuss the
concept of “converse” and to think of examples of when the converse of something is true and when it
isn’t. If A and B are the following statements, A = “the triangle is right-angled”, B = “the square of the
hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares on the other two sides”, then Pythagoras’ theorem is the
conclusion that A implies B ( A B ). The converse is that B A , that any triangle in which statement
B is true must be right-angled. So in this case A ⇔ B (A is equivalent to B), but in general if A B , B
doesn’t necessarily imply A. One example is if A = “the triangle is right-angled” and B = “the shape
has exactly three sides”. Here A B but B A because although all right-angled triangles have
three sides, not all triangles are right-angled.
• In three dimensions a 2 = b 2 + c 2 + d 2 . This makes sense by seeing that b 2 + c 2 is the square of the
hypotenuse of the right-angled triangle in the plane defined by sides b and c (the plane
perpendicular to side d ). Then applying 2-d Pythagoras’ theorem again gives the result.
(You could just as well start with c and d or with b and d .)
• Pythagoras’ Theorem is so powerful because it is readily applied to more complicated circumstances
than a single right-angled triangle; e.g., any non-right-angled isosceles triangle can be cut into two
congruent right-angled triangles.
• In solving right-angled triangles, it’s helpful to distinguish between finding the hypotenuse (square,
add, square root) and finding one of the shorter sides (sometimes called legs) (square, subtract,
square root).

2.7.1 NEED 1 cm × 1 cm squared dotty paper (see Answer:

section 2.1). Tilted Squares.
We are going to draw tilted squares on square If pupils get stuck drawing the squares, they can
dotty paper so that each vertex lies on a dot. say “2 along-1 up, 1 along-2 up, 2 along-1
2 down, 1 along, 2 down” as they go around the
Start by drawing a “ square”, where the square.
1
lowest side goes 2 along and 1 up (gradient of
1
2
). Work out the area. area = 5 cm2.
There are various ways of cutting up the square.
x (Some pupils may prefer to measure the sides
Try other squares and look for a pattern. with a ruler as accurately as they can and find
1
the area that way, although it may be less
“elegant”.)
area = x 2 + 1
x
Then try squares. area = x 2 + y 2
y
Then focus in on the right-angled triangle
“underneath” the square. What are these
results telling us about the sides of the If the area of a square is 36 cm2, then how long
triangle? are the sides? etc.

60 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 2.7.2 See if Pythagoras’ Theorem works for all The square on the longest side equals the sum
triangles (see “Triangles and Tilted Squares” of the squares on the other two sides only if the
sheet). triangle is right-angled.
Answers: If it is obtuse-angled, then the square on the
A obtuse-angled (25 > 9 + 10) longest side (the one opposite the obtuse
B right-angled (26 = 8 +18) angle) is greater than the sum of the squares on
C acute-angled (16 < 13 + 13) the two other sides.
D right-angled (25 = 5 + 20) If it is an acute-angled triangle, then the square
E obtuse-angled (9 > 2 + 5) of any of the sides is smaller than the sum of the
squares on the other two.
Try other shapes on the sides of right-angled
triangles; e.g., semicircles or equilateral Any shape will work provided that the shapes
triangles. on each side are mathematically similar. This
corresponds to multiplying the equation
hyp 2 = a 2 + b 2 by a constant.

2.7.3 How many different sized squares can you Answer: 3

draw on a 3 × 3 dotty grid if every vertex has For an n × n grid of dots,
to lie on a dot?
What if you use a larger square grid? no. of different sized
n
squares
(See the similar investigation using triangles 1 0
and quadrilaterals in “Polygons” section.) 2 1
3 3
The pattern is broken at n = 8 because the tilted 4 5
squares with sides of gradient ± 34 and 43 5 8
have sides with length 5 units, matching one of 6 11
the untilted squares already counted. This will 7 15
happen whenever you get Pythagorean Triples. 8 18 (yes)

2.7.4 Why is this shape not a regular octagon? Answer:

Although all the interior angles are all 135°,
there are four sides of unit length and four
“diagonal” sides of longer length 2 units.

This question aims to confront a common

misconception.

2.7.5 Proof: there are a vast number of them. This is a square with sides of length c inside a
The simplest is probably the one equating square with sides of length a + b .
areas in the diagram below (see right). The area of the large square can be worked
out in two different ways, and they must give
the same answer.

First method: area = (a + b)2 = a 2 + 2ab + b 2 .

(If pupils are not familiar with this result from
algebra, you can divide up the large square
c into two congruent rectangles, each of area
a ab , and two squares of different sizes, a 2 and
b 2 .)
b
Second method: add up the areas of the
smaller square and the four congruent right-
angled triangles; so
There are a large number of different proofs of area = c 2 + 4 × 12 ab = c 2 + 2ab .
Pythagoras’ Theorem: pupils could search on So a 2 + b 2 + 2ab = c 2 + 2ab , and therefore
the internet for other proofs.
a 2 + b 2 = c 2 (Pythagoras’ Theorem).

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 61

 2.7.6 Pythagorean Triples. Some pupils could write a BASIC (or similar)
The lengths of the sides of integer right- computer program to find Pythagorean Triples.
angled triangles.
(3,4,5); (5,12,13) and (7,24,25) are the A “primitive” Pythagorean Triple is one that
simplest. isn’t just a scaling up of a similar smaller
Any numbers ( 2 pq , p 2 − q 2 , p 2 + q 2 ) will triangle by multiplying all the sides by the same
amount; i.e., it’s one in which the sides are
always work (where p and q are integers pairwise co-prime. To get only these, p and q
and p > q ). must be co-prime and of opposite “parity” (one
odd, the other even).
A method equivalent to this for generating You can prove that these sides satisfy
Pythagorean triples is to add the reciprocals Pythagoras’ formula by squaring and adding:
of any 2 consecutive odd or consecutive even ( p 2 − q 2 ) 2 + (2 pq) 2
numbers. The numerator and denominator of
the answer (whether simplified or not) are the = p4 − 2 p2q2 + q4 + 4 p2q2
two shorter sides of a right-angled triangle; = ( p 2 + q 2 )2
e.g.,
1
6
+ 18 = 24
7
, giving the (7,24,25) triangle. This works because 1
+ 1
=
p +1+ p −1
=
2p
, as
p −1 p +1 p 2 −1 p 2 −1
above where q = 1 .

2.7.7 Pythagorean Triples. Answers:

1. Investigate the factors of the numbers in 1. In “primitive” triples (see above), the
“primitive” Pythagorean triples. largest number is always odd, and of the
2. Investigate the product of the two legs of a other two one is odd and one is even. One
Pythagorean triple. of the sides is always divisible by 2, one by
Try for different Pythagorean triples. 3 and one by 5 (see below). (These may all
3. Investigate the product of all three sides of be the same side; e.g., 60 in 11, 60, 61.)
a Pythagorean triple.
Try for different Pythagorean triples. 2. The product of the two legs is always a
multiple of 12 (or, equivalently, the area is
Answers (continued): always a multiple of 6). (Interestingly, this
3. The product of all three sides is always a area can never be a square number.)
multiple of 60. To show this, in addition to You can prove this using the expressions
the above argument we need to show that above:
pq ( p 2 − q 2 )( p 2 + q 2 ) is a multiple of 5. area = 12 × 2 pq × ( p 2 − q 2 ) = pq ( p 2 − q 2 ) .
If either p or q is a multiple of 5, then Here, either p is even or q must be, so pq
clearly the whole thing will be. If neither is, is a multiple of 2. If p or q are multiples of
then p = 5r ± 1 or p = 5r ± 2 and 3, then the whole thing will be a multiple of
q = 5s ± 1 or q = 5s ± 2 . When you multiply 6. If neither p nor q is a multiple of 3, then
out p 2 and q 2 , you find that they are either p = 3r ± 1 and q = 3s ± 1 , so p 2 − q 2 must be
1 more or 1 less or 4 more or 4 less than a multiple of 3 (multiply out p 2 and q 2 and
multiples of 5. So it is always the case that the “+1’s” cancel out), so the whole area is
either p 2 + q 2 or p 2 − q 2 is a multiple of 5, still a multiple of 6. Because the product of
so the whole thing must be. the legs is 2 pq ( p 2 − q 2 ) , then this number
will be a multiple of 12.

2.7.8 Fermat’s Last Theorem. Fermat (1601-1665) believed that there were no
We have some solutions to a 2 + b 2 = c 2 where solutions to the equation a n + b n = c n where
a , b and c are positive integers (see n > 2 and a , b and c are positive integers. He
Pythaogrean Triples above). claimed to have a proof but never wrote it
Try to find solutions to these equations: down. It has since been proved using highly
a 3 + b3 = c 3 complicated maths.
a 4 + b4 = c 4 There are many “Pythagorean Quadruples”;
e.g., (1, 2, 2, 3); (1, 4, 8, 9); (9, 8, 12, 17).
Pupils could look for solutions to
This time, any numbers ( 2 pr , 2qr ,
a 2 + b2 + c2 = d 2 .
p 2 + q 2 − r 2 , p 2 + q 2 + r 2 ) work, where
p, q , r > 0 .
62 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
 2.7.9 NEED keyboard diagrams (see sheets). A different way of thinking of “word length”.
Keyboard Typing. (The keys on the diagram are 1.5 cm × 1.5 cm
Imagine typing words with 1 finger. Say that to discourage measuring.)
each key is 1 cm × 1 cm. How far does your
finger have to move to type certain words?
(Calculate from the centre of each key.) Answers:
e.g., a word like FRED is easy. FRED = 3 cm (F-R, R-E and E-D)
What about HELP?
What four-letter word has the longest distance HELP = 3.64 + 6.58 + 1.12 = 11.34 cm
on the keyboard? (using Pythagoras’ Theorem)
ZONE = 14.58 cm, but there may be longer
words.

2.7.10 Two football players start side by side. They Answer: 10 m, if they started facing in opposite
each run 4 m in a straight line, turn 90° to the directions. (Imagine two 3-4-5 right-angled
right and run another 3 m, again in a straight triangles meeting at the players’ starting point.)
line. What is the furthest apart they could now
be?

2.7.11 A straight road contains a row of parked cars 1.5

all of width 1.5 m and length 4 m. If one of the
cars has a turning circle of 10 m, how much
space will it need in front of it so that it can
4
pull out without having to reverse?

What assumptions do you have to make?

(A turning circle of 10 m kerb-to-kerb means
that the car can just manage a U-turn at slow y 5
speed in a street 10 m wide.)

Answer: 3.5
In the diagram to the right, the distance from
the centre of the turning circle to the offside of
the car is 5 – 1.5 = 3.5 m. Applying Pythagoras’
Theorem, y 2 = 52 − 3.52 , giving y = 3.6 m,
measured from the mid-point of the length of
the car. The necessary distance in front of the We have assumed that the cars are parked
car is therefore 3.6 – 2 = 1.6 m. exactly in line, that both cars have the same
width and that the driver gets full right-lock as
soon as the car begins to move.

2.7.12 In the diagram below, find the shaded area in Answer:

terms of x . If the large circle has radius R and the small
circle, r , then the shaded area =
π R2 − π r 2 = π (R2 − r 2 ) .
x But by Pythagoras’ Theorem, x 2 = R 2 − r 2 , so
the shaded area = π x 2 .

2.7.13 A ladder of length 13 feet is standing upright Answer:

against a wall. If the top end slides down the 5 feet (a 5-12-13 right-angled triangle)
wall 1 foot, how far out from the wall will the
bottom end move?
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 63
2.7.14 A cable 1 km long is lying flat along the Answer: 22.4 m (a surprisingly large amount).
ground with its ends fixed. If its length is The shape produced is a (very) obtuse-angled
increased by 1 m but the ends are still fixed 1 isosceles triangle. Each half is a right-angled
km apart, how high up can the mid-point of triangle with hypotenuse 500.5 m and base 500
the cable be raised before it becomes taut? m. Calculating the third (vertical) side gives the
(Assume the cable doesn’t stretch or sag.) answer.

2.7.15 In the diagram below, C1 is a semicircular arc Answer:

centred on B and C2 is a quarter-circular arc Let BC = r .
centred on E. Prove that the area of the Then the area of the square BCDE = r 2 .
shaded lune between C1 and C2 is equal to the
Area of semicircle C1 = 12 π r 2 , and area of
area of the square BCDE.
quadrant ACE = 1
4
π( 2 r ) 2 = 12 π r 2 .
C1
Area of triangle ACE = 1
2
( 2 r ) 2 = r 2 (since
angle AEC = 90°, angle in a semicircle), so
C2 area of segment = 12 π r 2 − r 2 .
Therefore area of shaded lume =
A B C 1
π r 2 − ( 12 π r 2 − r 2 ) = r 2 = area of square BCDE,
2
as required.

This and other similar results were discovered

by Hippocrates of Chios (470-410 BC).

E D

2.7.16 A rope is attached to the top of a vertical pole Answer: The rope is 13 m long and the pole is
and at the bottom 1 m is lying on the ground. 12 m high (5, 12, 13 triangle).
When the end of the rope is pulled along the If h is the height of the pole, then
ground until it is taut, its end is 5 m from the (h + 1) 2 = h 2 + 52 , and solving this equation gives
base of the pole. How long is the rope and
these values.
how high is the pole? (The rope doesn’t
stretch.)

2.7.17 A narrow passageway of width 1 m contains

two ladders leaning against the walls. Each
has its foot at the bottom of one wall and its top
at the top of the other wall. If the walls have
heights 2 m and 3m, how high above the
ground is the point where the ladders cross?

Answer: 1.2 m
One approach is to model the ladders as
segments of the lines y = 3x and y = −2 x + 2 .
Solving simultaneously gives x = 0.4, y = 1.2 . b

Alternatively, you can use similar triangles. a

Using the letters as defined on the right,
y b y a y
= and = , so eliminating y,
x d d−x d
bx a(d − x) ad ab x
= so that x = and y = , so
d d a+b a+b d
the answer to the original question didn’t
depend on d (1 m).
Similar-looking problems where the lengths of
the ladders are given instead of vertical heights
are much harder, often leading to quartic
equations.

64 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.7.18 A piano in a cuboid crate has to be moved Answer: The tightest squeeze will happen when
round a right-angled corner in a corridor of the crate is positioned as below.
width 2 m. If no part of the crate is lifted off the
floor, what are the dimensions of the biggest
crate that will just go round the corner?
1
Assume that the floor is perfectly horizontal
and the walls perfectly vertical.
1
2
If the crate just fits, then its sides will be by
2
2 , so it’s area will be 1 m2.

2.7.19 A border of 1 m width around a rectangular Answer:

garden is covered with wet cement. You have Just, if you put them across at the corner. If l is
two 98 cm long narrow planks of wood. Can the length of the planks, and they just meet in
you use them to bridge across the cement the arrangement shown below, then the
from the outside to the inside? distances marked are as shown.

l l
2 2 2

l l 3l
Therefore, + = 1 , giving = 1 , so
2 2 2 2 2
2 2
l= = 0.94 m (2 dp).
3
But you would need to allow a bit for
overlapping of the planks and the grass.

2.7.20 Four identical apples of diameter 8 cm have Answer:

to be fitted into a cubical box. What is the The apples need to be stacked “tetrahedrally”
smallest box that will do? Assume that the so that there are 2 along the diagonal of the
apples are perfect spheres. bottom of the box and 2 along the other
diagonal in the top half of the box.

You can see that the diagonal of the box has

length 4 2 + 4 + 4 + 4 2 , so the sides of the box 4
8
have length (1 + 2 ) = 4 2 + 8 = 13.7 cm.
2

2.7.21 Which fits better, a square peg in a round hole Answer:

or a round peg in a square hole? A round peg in square hole occupies
π r2 π
= = 79% of the square, and this is
( 2r ) 4
2

better than a square peg in round hole, which

( )
2
2r
2 2
occupies only = = 64% of the circle.
πr 2
π

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 65

2.7.22 I am standing in a rectangular hall and my Answer:
distances from three of the corners are as Let a and b be as shown below.
shown below. How far must I be from the
a b
fourth corner?

6m 10 m
6m 10 m
x
9m
x
9m

Then using Pythagoras’ theorem in the top two

right-angled triangles, we can equate
expressions for the vertical dashed line, giving
62 − a 2 = 102 − b 2 .
Similarly for the bottom part of the diagram,
92 − a 2 = x 2 − b 2 , and subtracting these
equations leaves 92 − 62 = x 2 − 102 , and solving
this gives x = 145 = 12.04 m.

2.7.23 How big is the smallest circle which you can fit Answer:
a 2 cm by 4 cm rectangle into? The widest length in the rectangle will be the
diagonal, which is 22 + 42 = 20 cm, so that
will have to be the diameter. So the radius of
the circle will be 12 20 = 5 = 2.24 cm.

Triangles and Tilted Squares

Plot these triangles on axes going from 0 to 20 both horizontally and vertically.
(With a bit of overlapping, they will all fit onto one set of axes.)

Label them A to E, and note what kind of triangle each one is.

Draw tilted squares on each side and work out their areas.
Look at your results for each triangle.
What do you notice?

A (10, 7) (9, 4) (6, 4)

B (9, 15) (4, 14) (7, 17)
C (14, 7) (17, 5) (14, 3)
D (14, 16) (18, 14) (17, 12)
E (2, 3) (3, 5) (3, 2)

66 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

Q W E R T Y U I O P

A S D F G H J K L

Z X C V B N M ,

Q W E R T Y U I O P

A S D F G H J K L

Z X C V B N M ,

Q W E R T Y U I O P

A S D F G H J K L

Z X C V B N M ,

Q W E R T Y U I O P

A S D F G H J K L

Z X C V B N M ,
2.8 Loci and Constructions

• Strictly speaking, “constructions” can be done with pencil, compasses and straight-edge only.
No measuring with ruler or protractor is allowed. But often this topic gets merged with scale drawing,
so this distinction is lost.
• In drawing work it’s worth aiming for an accuracy of ± 1° and ± 1 mm. A sharp pencil helps.
• When using compasses, it can be useful to have a screwdriver handy for tightening them up.
• For some varied loci to draw, see the sheet.

2.8.1 NEED various props (e.g., clock, paper plate, Practical Lesson to introduce the concept.
door with handle, large book that will stand
up on its end). (See sheet.) You can consider that a point moves according
Explain that locus means “all the possible to a rule, or if you prefer “points” to be “fixed”
positions that fit a particular rule”. then the locus is the set of all points that satisfy a
On scrap paper, pupils draw the loci for particular condition. It may be that one or other
various situations described by the teacher. of these perspectives may be more helpful
depending on the context of the particular locus
problem.

2.8.2 NEED outdoor or large indoor space

(playground, hall, gym, etc.) People maths.
Follow these instructions, then try to describe
the loci. Should produce …
It’s important to be able to describe precisely 1. a circle, radius 2 m, centred on Leo;
the lines that you get. 2. the perpendicular bisector of the line
segment joining Max and Jo;
1. Leo, stay where you are. Everyone else, 3. If stuck, the teacher can stand 23 of the way
get 2 m away from Leo. (“Are you 2 m
from M to J and show that this point is
away from Leo? Could I stand here?”)
acceptable or the same distance M is from J
2. Max and Jo, stay where you are. Everyone
the other side of J (along MJ extended).
else, stand somewhere where you are the
same distance from Max as you are from Answer: a circle of radius 23 of the distance
Jo. between M and J, as shown below;
3. (Harder) Stand exactly twice as far from
Max as you are from Jo. (Need to realise
that there are points “in between” M and J
M J
and points beyond J but none beyond M.)
4. Get exactly 1 m away from that wall (a
long wall).
5. Get exactly 1 m away from that wall/hedge
(a shorter wall with ends). 4. a line parallel to the wall, 1 m from it;
6. Stand so that you’re the same distance 5. parallel lines along the sides and
from Jamie as you are from that wall. semicircles round the ends (see below);

There may be other possibilities according to

the space and objects you have available. If you
don’t have a suitable wall/hedge, you can use
chalk to mark a line on the ground.

(If it isn’t practicable to do this with people, you

could move coloured counters or cubes on a 6. a parabola.
desk so as to satisfy these conditions.)

2.8.3 Think of some examples of loci in everyday e.g., grass watered by garden sprinklers,
life and describe them in words. school catchment areas, bomb blast radii, TV
transmitter areas.
68 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
 2.8.4 NEED compasses. The Goat and the Shed. Answers:
Using a scale of 1 cm to 1 m, do a scale 1. Three quarters of a circle of grass around
drawing in the middle of the page of a the shed.
rectangular shed that is 3 m by 5 m. Area = 34 π 22 = 9.42 m2.
Do a plan view (from above).
The shed is surrounded by grass and a goat is
2. Along the 5 m side the situation is similar to
tied up to one outside corner of the shed.
before, but along the 3 m side the rope will
reach past the next corner of the shed and
1. If the rope is 2 m long, shade in the grass
will catch and the goat can then make an
that the goat can eat.
additional quadrant of radius 1 m (see
Calculate the area of grass it can eat.
below).
2. The goat would like more freedom (and
grass!), so the rope is replaced by one that
is 4 m long.
On a new drawing of the shed, again
shade in the grass that the goat can reach
and calculate its area.

3. What happens if the length of the rope is

increased to 6 m? Area = 3
4
π 42 + 14 π 12 = 38.48 m2.
3. The rope catches at both corners now, so
4. How long does the rope have to be to
area = 34 π 62 + 14 π 12 + 14 π 32 = 92.68 m2.
reach all the way round the shed? How
much grass can the goat eat then? 4. 8 m to reach right round the shed, and now
area = 34 π 82 + 14 π 32 + 14 π 52 = 177.50 m2.
5. (Much harder) Finally a 10 m rope is tried. 5. Now the same bit of grass can be reached
How much grass can the goat eat now? by the goat going clockwise or
anticlockwise around the shed, so this
What assumptions have we made in solving method of calculation will overestimate the
these problems? area.
We’ve ignored the difference between the The true answer is about 280 m2.
place where the rope ends and the “reach” of
the goat’s mouth; assumed the rope is always
horizontal and the walls of the shed are vertical;
assumed the rope doesn’t stretch or break or
get chewed through!; assumed no limits to the Some of the principles of mathematical
area beyond the shed; etc. modelling again.
2.8.5 Cats and Dogs. e.g.,
A cat and a dog don’t like each other. They dog wall
are kept on leads fastened to a wall at
separate points. If the dog’s lead is 2 m long,
draw diagrams to find out where the cat’s lead
could be fastened and how long it could be so
that the two animals would never be able to
reach each other. cat
Try different shaped areas.
Use a scale of 1 cm to 1 m.

2.8.6 Ellipse. Another method for generating an ellipse is to

Draw a circle with radius 5 cm and mark a tie string slack between two fixed points and
point inside the circle about 4 cm from the push the string taut with a pencil. Then draw
centre. Fold the circle so that a point on the with the pencil keeping the string tight. The two
circumference just touches the marked point. fixed points are the foci of the ellipse.
Unfold the paper and draw a line along the (See “Loci” sheet.)
fold mark. Repeat for a different point on the
circumference. (Keep the point inside the Eventually you will end up with an ellipse.
circle the same.)
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 69
 2.8.7 John wants to walk from his house H to school Answer:
S via the river (to feed the ducks) along as H
short a total distance as possible.
What path should he take? (He can feed the
ducks just as well at any point along the river.)
S
H

S
S1
Light travels via the shortest route between two
You can fix H and S at certain perpendicular points (this is what we mean by “straight”), so
distances from the river, and a certain imagine that the river is a mirror and H is a light
distance apart, and try by trial and source. To get the reflected beam to go through
improvement to get the shortest total distance. S, construct S1, the reflection of S in the mirror
(e.g., scale 1 cm = 100 m) and join H and S1 with a straight line. Where this
intersects the mirror is the point on the river
that John should walk to.

2.8.8 There are three towns A, B and C at different Answer:

distances from each other. Where should you
build roads to connect the three towns so that Two possibilities:
the minimum length of road is constructed? 1. If one of the angles in the triangle is ≥ 120°,
Do a clear drawing (A, B and C can be the then road should be built from this vertex to
vertices of any scalene triangle) and mark on the other two;
the exact positions of the roads. 2. If none of the angles is as big as 120°, then
you need to find the “Fermat Point”, which
when joined to each vertex makes three
lines all at 120° to each other. One way of
finding this point is to construct equilateral
triangles on each side of the original
C triangle and join the outermost vertices of
these to the opposite vertices of the original
triangle. Where the lines cross is the Fermat
F B Point. See diagram on the left.

The Fermat point is F.

The roads should be built along AF, BF and CF.

2.8.9 NEED A4 plain paper and sticky tape. You could use three sheets of A4 paper taped
Do an accurate scale drawing of a football together and a scale of 1 cm for every 2 yards.
pitch using this information.
1. The pitch should be 100 yards long and 50 Green paper adds a bit of realism!
yards wide.
2. The centre circle should have a radius of
10 yards.
3. The goal is 8 yards wide and surrounded Pupils could of course research the
by the 6-yard box (a rectangle 20 yards by measurements for other kinds of pitches and
6 yards). draw those if they prefer.
4. The penalty area is the 18-yard box (a
rectangle 44 yards by 18 yards).
The penalty point should be 12 yards from the
goal line and half way across the width of the
pitch.
70 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
2.8.10 Drawing accurate triangles. Answers:
Use compasses to draw these triangles as 1. isosceles: A = B = 51.3°; C = 77.4°;
accurately as possible. 2. r-angled: A = 36.9°; B = 53.1°; C = 90.0°;
1. AB = 10 cm; AC = 8 cm; BC = 8 cm; 3. obt-ang: A = 49.5°; B = 22.3°; C = 108.2°;
2. AB = 10 cm; AC = 8 cm; BC = 6 cm; 4. no such triangle because in any triangle the
3. AB = 10 cm; AC = 4 cm; BC = 8 cm; sum of the two shorter sides must be more
4. AB = 10 cm; AC = 4 cm; BC = 5 cm. than the longest side (the shortest distance
from A to B must be the line AB, so AC and
Pupils can check the accuracy of their drawings BC together must come to more than this,
by measuring the angles. otherwise it won’t join up).
Exact values are given on the right.

2.8.11 Drawing Polygons with Compasses. This can make good display work.
Pupils first need to train their compasses to
behave properly, so it’s worth starting by
making sure everyone can draw a circle and B
get a single clean smooth line (no wobbles).

1. Regular Hexagon – the easiest.

Draw a circle of radius 5 cm in the middle of
the page. Keep the compasses open at 5 cm.
Put a mark on the circumference at the top of
A
the circle. Put the compass point here and
mark off the two points the pencil reaches to C
on the circle. Repeat at those points until you
have 6 equally spaced points round the circle.
Join them up with a ruler.

2. Regular Pentagon – need to be good at

following instructions! (See diagram right.)
Draw a circle of radius 5 cm in the middle of To draw the perpendicular diameters, pupils
the page. Draw two perpendicular diameters could use the grid lines if using squared paper;
(horizontal and vertical). otherwise need to do a perpendicular bisector.
Set the compasses to a radius of 2.5 cm. With
centre A (mid-point of horizontal radius, see Could bisect the radius to get the 2.5 cm, or
right) and radius AB draw an arc that cuts the “cheat” by measuring with a ruler!
circumference at B and the horizontal
diameter at C.
Then draw an arc centred at B with radius BC
to cut the circumference twice. This distance
(BC) is the length of the side of the regular
pentagon, so step this round the
circumference and join up the points.

3. Regular Octagon – not too hard.

Draw a square with sides 8 cm and draw in the
diagonals. Set the compasses to a radius of
half the diagonal (the distance from a vertex to
the centre of the square) and draw an arc
centred on one of the vertices so that it
crosses the two adjacent sides. Repeat for the
other three vertices and join up the 8 crossing
points with a ruler (see right).

2.8.12 Constructions with compasses:

1. Perpendicular Bisector of a line segment: This makes use of the fact that the diagonals of a
all the points that are the same distance rhombus bisect each other.
from one end of the given line as they are It doesn’t matter how far the compasses are
from the other; opened so long as it’s more than half the
distance between the two starting points and it
2. Angle Bisector of two non-parallel lines: doesn’t alter.
the line that makes the same angle with
each of the starting lines.
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 71
 Loci
Try to sketch these loci as carefully as you can.

1 The locus of a point on the front tip of an aeroplane as it comes in to land.

2 The locus of a white dot of paint on the moving end of the minute hand on a clock.
What if the dot of paint is only half way along the minute hand?

3 The locus, viewed from above, of a point on the door handle when I open the door.

4 The locus of a ball thrown over a wall.

5 The locus of a point on the rim of a bicycle wheel as the bicycle moves without
slipping along a flat horizontal road at a steady speed.
What would happen if the bicycle speeded up?

6 The locus of a point on the flange of a train wheel as the train moves along a flat
horizontal track at a steady speed.

7 The locus of a point part-way along one of the spokes of a bicycle wheel as the
bicycle moves along a flat horizontal road at a steady speed.

8 The locus of a point on the circumference of a circle as it rolls (without slipping)

around another circle that is the same size.
e.g., try rolling a 10 p coin around another one.

9 The locus of a point whose total distance from two fixed points is a constant.
e.g., tie a slack piece of string between the two points and use a pencil to make the
string taut – draw with the pencil, keeping the string taut.

10 The locus of the points all the way along a uniform (same all the way along) rope
suspended between two horizontal points high enough so the rope doesn’t touch
the ground.

11 The locus of a point on the top right corner of a book as the book “rolls” (without
slipping) along a table.
Draw this one as accurately as you can. You could take the book as being 15 cm
wide by 20 cm high (i.e., a 3:4 ratio of width to height). Its thickness doesn’t matter
so long as it is thick enough to stand up without falling over.

12 The locus of a point mid-way along a ladder as the ladder slides down from a
vertical position against a wall until it is horizontal. (The top of the ladder slides
down the wall; the bottom of the ladder slides along the ground.)

What other loci can you think of and sketch?

72 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Loci ANSWERS
1 Aeroplane landing: something like this 2 Dot on the end of the minute hand of a
clock: a circle of radius equal to the
length of the minute hand and centred
on the middle of the clock.

If the dot were only half way along, the

circle would have the same centre but
half the radius.

3 Door handle as the door opens: 4 Ball thrown over a wall:

roughly a quarter of a circle.
(Some pupils will think it’s a straight line.)

The curve is part of a parabola

The equation is y = ax 2 + b , a > 0 .

5 Bicycle wheel: point on the rim 6 Train wheel: point on the flange

(You can demonstrate this with a plate marked Called a prolate cycloid.
with a dot and rolled along a table – when the
dot touches the table it doesn’t slide This is the solution to the following
backwards, so there are no loops.) puzzle: If a train is travelling from
London to Edinburgh, what points on the
Called a cycloid. Looks a bit like a row of train are (at a given instant) moving
semicircles but isn’t. towards London?
If the bicycle speeded up, it would make no (Assume that the train keeps going
difference to the curve, although the later throughout the journey.)
parts would get drawn faster.
Answer: points on the flanges of the
The cycloid has lots of interesting properties; wheels.
e.g., (Passengers walking down the train will
• it’s the strongest shape for the arch of a still be heading towards Edinburgh
bridge; because their speed relative to the
• the area under each “hump” is 3 times the carriage will be tiny compared with the
area of the bicycle wheel; speed of the train.)
• if you turn the shape upside down and roll a
marble down the inside it takes the same The parametric equations are
amount of time to reach the bottom wherever x = rθ − d sin θ and y = r − d cos θ ,
you start it from – it’s also the solution to the where d > r .
“brachistochrone problem”: what path should
a particle roll down to get from one point to a
lower point in the shortest possible time?

The parametric equations are x = r (θ − sin θ )

and y = r (1 − cos θ ) , where r > 0 .
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 73
 Loci (continued) ANSWERS
7 Bicycle wheel: point part-way along one of the 8 A point on the circumference of a coin
spokes rolling around another coin:

Called a curtate cycloid.

The parametric equations are x = rθ − d sin θ

and y = r − d cos θ , where 0 < d < r .
Called a cardioid (means “heart-
shaped”, like “cardiac”).
The polar equation is r = 2a (1 ± cos θ ) .

9 Pencil and string: an ellipse. 10 Rope suspended between two points:

The parametric equations are x = a cos θ and

y = b sin θ ,
2
and the Cartesian equation is x2
a2
+ by2 = 1 .
Called a catenary.
An alternative definition of an ellipse is “the Looks a bit like a parabola but it isn’t.
locus of a point which moves so that the ratio
of its distance from a fixed point to its The equation is y = a cosh ( ax ) .
perpendicular distance from a fixed line is a
constant <1”. The fixed point is called the
focus and the fixed line the directrix.

11 Corner of book balanced on its end as it “rolls” along the table:

(It helps to draw in the positions of the book at each stage.)

The book is moving from left to right. After it rotates 90°, the next rotation is about the dot, so
this point doesn’t move. Notice that in the final 90° rotation the dot moves above the height of
its final position.
The radii of the arcs are 20 cm, 15 cm and 152 + 202 = 25 cm (Pythagoras’ Theorem, a 5 times
enlargement in cm of a 3-4-5 triangle).

12 Mid-point of ladder as it slides (not tips) from against a vertical wall until it is horizontal.
The locus is a quarter of the circumference of a circlem radius half the length of the ladder.
74 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
 Triangle Properties and Words
name definition properties
incentre point where the 3 angle bisectors the incentre is the centre of the
intersect inscribed circle, which touches each
of the sides of the triangle

orthocentre point where the 3 altitudes intersect if you join together the feet of the
(an altitude is the line joining a altitudes, they make another
vertex to the opposite side so that it triangle called the pedal triangle,
is perpendicular to the opposite and the orthocentre is the incentre
side) of this pedal triangle

circumcentre point where the 3 perpendicular the circumcentre is the centre of the
bisectors of the triangle intersect circumscribed circle, which goes
through all 3 vertices

centroid point where the 3 medians intersect if the triangle were a thin uniform
(a median is the line joining a vertex lamina, the centroid would be the
to the mid-point of the opposite position of the centre of mass;
side) the centroid divides the medians in
the ratio 1:2

The orthocentre, circumcentre and centroid are collinear (Euler’s line).

Triangle Properties and Words

name definition properties
incentre point where the 3 angle bisectors the incentre is the centre of the
intersect inscribed circle, which touches each
of the sides of the triangle

orthocentre point where the 3 altitudes intersect if you join together the feet of the
(an altitude is the line joining a altitudes, they make another
vertex to the opposite side so that it triangle called the pedal triangle,
is perpendicular to the opposite and the orthocentre is the incentre
side) of this pedal triangle

circumcentre point where the 3 perpendicular the circumcentre is the centre of the
bisectors of the triangle intersect circumscribed circle, which goes
through all 3 vertices

centroid point where the 3 medians intersect if the triangle were a thin uniform
(a median is the line joining a vertex lamina, the centroid would be the
to the mid-point of the opposite position of the centre of mass;
side) the centroid divides the medians in
the ratio 1:2

The orthocentre, circumcentre and centroid are collinear (Euler’s line).

2.9 3-D Solids and Nets

• You need to decide whether or not to use the words “shape” (2-d) and “solid” (3-d) interchangeably.
It can be helpful to avoid saying “shape” when referring to a 3-d object.
Pupils will say “square” when they mean “cube”, and you can say, “a square is the shape on the end
of a cube, but what’s the whole solid called?” (Note that in common usage, “solid” means “hard”, so
that a pile of sand or a sponge might not be considered solid (or not very), although in science they
would be. Also liquids and gases are “solids” in maths!)
• Collect Easter egg boxes: often get isosceles trapezoidal prisms and the occasional pyramid
(sometimes truncated). Easter holiday homework can be to look for unusual boxes and bring them in
to be named! At other times of the year, chocolate boxes are often interesting solids.
• This can be an encouraging topic for some pupils who often find maths hard, because it relies on
quite different skills (e.g., spatial awareness) from those needed in some other areas of maths.

2.9.1 Naming Solids. It’s very useful to have actual A cuboid has 6 rectangular faces: none need be
3-d solids (cardboard boxes or plastic solids) square, or two opposite ones could be square
to pass around the room. “What has David or all 6 could be square, in which case it’s a
got? Where do you come across triangular cube.
prisms?”, etc. Cubes, cuboids and cylinders are all prisms.
Prism: in a certain direction parallel slices are A triangular prism is a “tent” shape, and a
all congruent (e.g., slices of bread) (same typical glass or Perspex prism in Science will be
cross-section all the way through); a triangular prism.
Pyramid: triangular faces that all meet at one Pencils are sometimes hexagonal prisms and
point. sometimes cylinders (with cones at the point).
A tetrahedron is a triangle-based pyramid. The
(See sheet of drawings, suitable for acetate: Egyptian pyramids are square-based pyramids.
point and name: “Can anyone name them all?”
Can turn the acetate round and over to vary “Hold up your solid if you think it’s a prism”,
the appearance.) etc.

2.9.2 I-spy a solid in the classroom; e.g., “I can see e.g., “The object is a hollow cylinder of
a triangular prism” and others have to guess diameter 8 cm and length 2 cm.” Answer: a roll
what the object is. Initially give no indication of sticky tape.
of size. You can also describe mathematically
an object (perhaps on the school site) that
everyone knows and others have to guess
what it is.

2.9.3 Prisms. Instead of just cataloguing solids as Answers:

prisms or not prisms, you can do it the other 1. cylinder
way round by asking what solids these could 2. cone or sphere
be: 3. triangular prism
(All the solids are common ones.) 4. tetrahedron
5. cube or cuboid
“cross-sectional shape” prism? 6. square-based pyramid or octahedron
1 circle yes
2 circle no There are many other possible answers.
3 triangle yes
4 triangle no
5 square yes
6 square no

2.9.4 What very common everyday object has Answer: ordinary house brick
approximately these dimensions?
20 cm × 10 cm × 8 cm Could estimate how many used in a house.
76 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
 2.9.5 Polyhedra. A regular polyhedron (called Answers: There are only 5:
Platonic) has the same regular polygon for all • cube (6 square faces),
of its faces, and all its vertices are identical. • regular tetrahedron (4 equilateral triangle
Find out how many regular polyhedra there faces),
are and what they are. • regular octahedron (8 equilateral triangle
faces),
Named after Plato (427-347 BC). • regular dodecahedron (12 regular
pentagon faces) and
• regular icosahedron (20 equilateral
NEED 3-d models or 2-d sketches of regular triangle faces).
polyhedra. What is the connection between The regular tetrahedron, the regular
the numbers of vertices, faces and edges that octahedron and the regular icosahedron are
they have? deltahedra (polyhedra whose faces are all
equilateral triangles).

Euler’s relationship works for convex polyhedra Euler’s formula (1707-1783):

with straight edges and flat faces so long as vertices + faces = edges +2
they don’t have “holes” in them!

2.9.6 What symmetry does a cube have? Answer: 9 planes of symmetry (3 parallel to
faces and 6 at 45° to pairs of faces); 13 axes of
symmetry (3 through the centre of opposite
faces, 4 through opposite vertices and 6
through the mid-points of opposite edges).

2.9.7 NEED molecular model kit (Science dept.). Some of these molecules have these structures
Chemical molecules and crystals often have only approximately, and the atoms are always
symmetrical structures. You can imagine moving around anyway.
joining every atom to every other atom.
For example, trigonal planar (e.g., BF3);
octagonal (e.g., SF6); tetrahedral (e.g., CH4);
square-based pyramidal (e.g., IF5); trigonal
bipyramidal (e.g., PF5); etc.

2.9.8 NEED isometric paper (see sheet) and “Isometric” means “equal distance”; the
interlocking cubes. Polycubes. distances from any dot to its six nearest
How many solids can you make by linking neighbours are all the same.
together four cubes? Must have the paper “portrait” so that there are
Draw them on isometric paper. vertical lines of dots.
The 8 tetracubes are shown below.

Which ones would look different in a mirror Only the last two are “chiral” (have non-
(ignore the colours of the cubes)? superimposable mirror images – like left and
right hands). In fact, they are mirror images of
Chirality is important with chemical molecules.
each other. All the others have at least one
Different mirror image molecules
plane of symmetry.
(enantiomers) have different properties.

What if I give you another cube so that you There are 29 so-called “pentacubes”, and with
have five? more cubes you quickly get vast numbers of
polycubes (6 give 166, 7 give 1023, etc.).

2.9.9 NEED drawings of “impossible solids” – Suitable for display.

drawing these on isometric paper (perhaps
enlarging them at the same time) is an
interesting way of getting used to 3-d
isometric drawing.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 77

2.9.10 NEED “Cube or Not?” sheets, scissors, glue. Answers:
Pupils should be encouraged to find other A, C, E make cubes; B, D, F don’t. (“ACE” is
nets that will make cubes and to make up easy to remember as you discuss with pupils.)
puzzles for each other.

How many possible nets are there for a cube? Out of 35 possible hexominoes, only 11 are nets
for a cube. Counting systematically:
1. Four squares in a line (6 of these):

Here we count as the same nets which are

rotations or reflections (turn it over) of each
other.

This is a good task to encourage systematic

work.
2. Only three squares in a line (4 of these):

3. Only two squares in a line (just 1 of these):

2.9.11 Flaps on a net. It generally works if you go clockwise or

Often we miss them out to keep things simple. anticlockwise around the perimeter of the net
If you need flaps for the glue, where do you putting a flap on every other edge that you
have to put them? come to.
(If in doubt, it’s better to put one, because you
can always cut it off if you don’t need it but it’s
(See sheets for cube, tetrahedron, triangular more of a problem if you don’t have one that
prism, octahedron, icosahedron and you do turn out to need! Cutting off unnecessary
dodecahedron.) flaps is a bit amateurish, though!)

2.9.12 (Need Pythagoras’ Theorem) Answer: Most people suggest going vertically
A spider wants to crawl from the top left back down the wall and then diagonally across the
corner of a cube room to the bottom right front floor, with a total of 3(1 + 2 ) = 7.24 m, but there
corner. If the sides of the room are all 3 m,
is a shorter way, most easily seen by drawing
then what is the shortest distance the spider
the net of the room:
can crawl?
(No jumping/webbing, etc. allowed!)

You can make up similar puzzles using cuboid

rooms, or more complicated solids. The Here the distance is only 3 5 = 6.71 m.
spider can start in the middle of a wall.

78 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.9.13 What kind of paper would be the easiest to Answers:
use to draw a net for these solids? 1. squared (or square dotty) paper;
2. if you use a Pythagorean Triple (e.g., 3-4-5),
1. a cube or a cuboid; then squared paper is easiest; otherwise,
2. a right-angled triangular prism; squared paper or plain paper and
3. a non-right-angled triangular prism; compasses is best;
4. a square-based pyramid; 3. plain paper and compasses or isometric
5. a hexagonal-based pyramid; paper if you’re careful;
6. a tetrahedron; 4. squared paper;
7. a cone; 5. isometric paper or plain paper and
8. a sphere. compasses;
6. isometric paper;
7. plain paper and compasses;
8. no net for a sphere is possible!

2.9.14 A normal (cube) dice has the numbers 1 to 6 Answer: There are two different possible dice
on its six faces and the numbers on every pair like this, sometimes called left-handed and
of opposite faces add up to 7. Draw a net for right-handed dice because they are mirror
such a dice. Are all such dice the same as images of each other.
each other?

2.9.15 NEED acetate of two nets of a cube. Answers:

Ask questions like these: 1. 2, 4, 6;
2. 3;
When the net is folded up to make a cube, 3. star.
1. which faces will be next to the number 1?
2. which face will be opposite the 5?
3. which face will the arrow point to?, etc.

2.9.16 NEED card, scissors, glue, sticky tape. Pupils tend to be too adventurous at the
Shape Sorter. beginning and need to be encouraged to
This is an object small children play with to “practise” by starting with cubes and cuboids
get used to matching different shapes/solids. before making a twelve-pointed star!
Each solid must fit through one hole only
(otherwise the child will get confused!), yet it The “holes” need designing first to make sure
must go through the right hole reasonably that none of the solids will go through the
easily (or the child will get frustrated!). wrong holes; e.g., you could begin with a
cylinder of diameter 4 cm. A square that won’t
Design and make a shape sorter out of go through its hole has to have sides longer
cardboard. Pupils could use a ready-made than 2 2 = 2.8 cm, but the sides of the square
box (e.g., a shoe box or cereal box) and just have to be less than 4 cm, otherwise the
cut holes in it and make solids to fit through. cylinder will go through its hole.
Ideally, when all the solids are inside the box At each stage you have to check that nothing
the lid will go on for convenient storage. you’ve designed so far will go through the hole
for anything else.

A challenge is to make a shape sorter that If the shapes are prisms, you can neglect the
uses only cubes and cuboids. “length” dimension so long as it is long enough
not to let the solid go through any of the holes.
You cannot have more than one cylinder in
your shape sorter. Why not? Because mathematically similar shapes (all
circles are similar) of different sizes will always
The fact that circles have “infinite” rotational go through each other (so you can’t have more
symmetry may be why manhole covers are than one cube, either, because all squares are
round – there’s no risk of the cover falling down similar).
the hole. (For example, hexagonal covers on
hexagonal holes could do that.)

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 79

2.9.17 How many colours do you need to colour the Answer: 3 is the minimum number of colours
faces of a cube if no two faces that share an needed (colour opposite faces the same
edge are allowed to have the same colour? colour).
How many different ways can it be done if you
have more than this many colours? no. of colours no. of ways
1 0
For these purposes, a cube is equivalent to the 2 0
following 2-d “graph” (the “outside” 3 1
corresponds to a face as well). 6 30

2.9.18 Conic Sections. Answers: Good visualisation exercise.

Imagine a double-cone shape, as below, that
goes on forever in the up and down
directions.
1. horizontal plane: a circle (or dot if through
the point);
2. plane at an angle less than steepness of the
sides of the cone: ellipse (or dot if through
the point);
3. plane at an angle equal to the steepness of
the sides of the cone: parabola (or a straight
line if through the point);
4. plane at an angle steeper than the sides of
the cone: hyperbola – two separate bits of
curve, discontinuous with asymptotes (or a
Describe the curves you would get if you pair of straight lines if through the point).
sliced through it at different angles with a flat
surface (plane).

2.9.19 NEED A4 plain paper, scissors, sticky tape. Answer:

Net of a Cone. You need to cut out a sector of a circle of radius
I want to make a cone with a vertical height of equal to the slant height of the cone. By
8 cm and a base radius of 6 cm. Pythagoras’ Theorem, the sloping sides of the
What exactly will the net have to be?
cone will go up 62 + 82 = 10 cm (twice a 3-4-5
triangle). The circumference of the base of the
cone will be 2π r = 12π , so we need the sector
of our 10 cm circle to have arc length 12π , and
12π 3
this will be = of the 10 cm circle’s
8 cm 20π 5
circumference, or 3
5
× 360 = 216 ˚. When cut out
and folded up, this will make the required cone.

6 cm
216˚
(The cone could be to hold chips or popcorn.)
10 cm
The cone also needs a circular base of radius
6 cm. Can you cut out everything you need
from one sheet of A4 paper?
Yes, if you’re careful. Volume = 1
3
π r 2h = 302 cm3.

80 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Cube or Not?
Cut out these shapes.
Will they fold up to make cubes?
Try to decide first, then cut them out and see.

A B

Why do some make cubes while others don’t?

82 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

♠
∇ ♥
Cube
It’s easier to put your name on before you fold it up!

84 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

Tetrahedron
It’s easier to put your name on before you fold it up!

Triangular Prism
It’s easier to put your name on before you fold it up!

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 85

Octahedron
It’s easier to put your name on before you fold it up!

86 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

Icosahedron
It’s easier to put your name on before you fold it up!

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 87

Dodecahedron
It’s easier to put your name on before you fold it up!

88 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.10 Volume

• If you’re using the words “solid” for 3-d and “shape” for 2-d, pupils need to realise that, of course,
you can work out volumes of liquids and gases as well as solids. (In particular, volumes of solids and
liquids are more or less constant whereas gas volume depends on pressure, temperature, etc. and
not just on the mass.) Capacity is just the volume of space (or air) inside a “hollow solid”.
• There is some overlap with section 2.15, but the following is pretty essential:

÷1000 ÷1000

cm3 = ml litre m3

×1000 ×1000

• Some opportunity to handle and count cubes is essential in the early stages of this topic.
Cubes which can be fitted together to make larger cubes/cuboids/etc. are ideal.

2.10.1 Words that mean different things in maths Take-away, difference, product, factor, prime,
from what they mean in ordinary life or other negative, positive, sign, odd, even, root, index,
subjects. power, improper, rounded, interest,
Think of some examples. expression, identity, solution, term, subject,
acute, obtuse, reflex, face, net, square, plane,
In maths/science, volume means how much prism, compasses, translation, sketch, origin,
space something takes up or how much space arc, chord, similar, tangent, mean, range, raw,
there is inside something (sometimes called frequency, certain, impossible, independent,
capacity). etc.
Also volume (loudness in science, vague
“amount” in common usage, or can refer to a
book).

2.10.2 NEED cubes, common cuboid objects. If the cubes you’re using aren’t cm3 you can say
How many cubes make up this cube/cuboid? that you’re imagining they are.
You can show 2 × 2 × 2 and 2 × 3 × 4 etc. Stick with integer lengths at this stage.
cuboids to see that volume means the number
of cm3 that will fit inside. Hence multiply the This is really
three dimensions to find the volume. volume = area of one layer × number of layers.

Find the volume, by measuring the typical values: (pupils tend to underestimate)
dimensions, of common objects: maths book, exercise book: 100 cm3; textbook: 1000 cm3
video cassette, briefcase, locker, room? (we’re learning a litre of maths this year!)
Start by estimating how many cm3 would go video cassette: 400 cm3; briefcase: 30 litres;
into it. locker: 70 litres (roughly the volume of a human
being – some pupils will fit inside their lockers,
but don’t try it!).

2.10.3 If we woke up tomorrow and everything had It depends whether other things besides length
doubled in size, would there be any way to changed as well. Presumably things would look
tell? (Poincaré, 1854-1912, originally posed the same because our own eyes and bodies
this famous riddle.) would be twice as large (so perspective effects
would be the same), but if there were no
More precisely we mean if every length corresponding increase in mass (for example) it
doubled (so 5 cm became 10 cm and so on), would be easy to detect, because, for example,
because of course that would mean that area gravity would be weaker. To make it work, sub-
had become four times as much and volume atomic forces would have to increase too.
eight times as much.

90 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.10.4 NEED A4 1 cm × 1 cm squared paper,
scissors, sticky tape. Maximum Volume from a
piece of paper. This size makes for easier calculations than
Cut out an 18 cm by 24 cm rectangle from a using actual A4 size.
sheet of A4 paper.
We want to make an open box (no lid) out of
this paper that has the maximum possible Let x cm be the length of the side of the square
volume. We’ll cut out squares from each cut off. Then we get the following results:
corner and see what is the maximum volume
we can get. x dimensions of box volume (cm3)
(Imagine you were collecting sweets in it from 1 16 × 22 × 1 352
a big boxful at the front of the room!) 2 14 × 20 × 2 560
3 12 × 18 × 3 648
4 10 × 16 × 4 640
3.4 11.2 × 17.2 × 3.4 655

Could plot a graph of volume against x , but

you can see from the numbers that the
maximum is between 2 and 4. Trial and
improvement gives x = 3.4 cm (1 dp).
(diagram not to scale)
It’s possible to get the same answer using
Start by cutting off 1 cm × 1 cm squares from
calculus:
each of the four corners. Fold up the sides to
make a very shallow box. V = x(24 − 2 x)(18 − 2 x) = 4 x3 − 84 x 2 + 432 x , so
differentiating,
dV
dx
= 12 x 2 − 168 x + 432 = 0 for stationary points,
Making a cone out of the paper would probably
give a smaller volume. (If you cut out a and solving this quadratic gives x = 3.4 as the
quadrant of radius 18 cm you could roll this up only solution in the range 0 < x < 9 .
into a cone of slant height 18 cm and base
radius 18 ÷ 4 = 4.5 cm, so the volume would be
about 350 cm3.)

2.10.5 NEED interlocking cubes. The surface area of a solid is the area of its net
Minimum Surface Area for a given Volume (excluding any “tabs”), if it has one. (A sphere
(the above problem in reverse). has a surface area although it has no net.)
This could be introduced as the problem of
wrapping up a number of identical cubes so “Best” would mean not just the minimum
as to use the minimum amount of wrapping amount of cardboard; you’d have to consider
paper. “What’s the best shape for a packet of how the packet would look, how easy it would
sugar lumps?” would be a more open-ended be to fit the design and details on the packet,
problem. how stable it would be, etc.

The minimum surface area is obtained when the

cubes make a solid that is nearest to a cube in
shape (see below).

Think of a situation where maximum or no. of max surface min surface

minimum surface area is important.
cubes area area
24 1 × 1 × 24: 98 2 × 3 × 4: 52
Keeping warm (huddle up – minimise surface 27 1 × 1 × 27: 110 3 × 3 × 3: 54
area); getting a sun-tan (spread out – maximise 48 1 × 1 × 48: 194 3 × 4 × 4: 80
surface area). 64 1 × 1 × 64: 258 4 × 4 × 4: 96
Surface tension causes soap bubbles to
minimise their surface area (pupils may have Maximum surface area comes from arranging
seen a demonstration in Science). the cubes in a long line ( a prism with cross-
Lungs have a very large surface area (over section 1 × 1). In fact, it doesn’t affect the
100 m2) because that’s where oxygen is surface area if the “line” has bends in it, but
absorbed. then the solid isn’t a simple cuboid any more.
Granulated sugar dissolves faster than sugar
lumps because the water molecules have more In general, for n cubes, the maximum surface
exposed sugar to bump into. area = 4n + 2 .
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 91
2.10.6 Length comparisons versus volume There are issues here of misleading statistics.
comparisons. People often choose length
comparisons to make something seem a lot
and volume comparisons to make something
not seem that much.

How many 10 p coins would you need to make

a pile all the way to the top of Mount Everest Answer:
(8800 m)? −3 = 8.8 × 10
8800 6
coins (= £ 880 000).
10
Assume each coin is 1 mm thick.

How big a container would you need to put Each 10 p coin would fit inside a cuboid box 1
them in? mm × 25 mm × 25 mm, which is a volume of
(1× 10−3 ) × (25 × 10−3 ) × (25 × 10−3 ) = 6.25 × 10−7 m3.
So all of these coins will take up only
(8.8 × 106 ) × (6.25 × 10−7 ) = 5.5 m3; i.e. a cube box
with sides 1.75 m (not that big).
You can do a similar thing with people.
If you lined up all the people in the world end Assuming that there are about 6.5 × 109 people
to end, how far would they stretch? in the world, and taking an average height of
(Assume that they are lying down end-to-end.) 2 m, the distance would be
(6.5 × 109 ) × 2 = 1.3 × 1010 m.
The average distance to the moon is about
1.3×1010
4 × 108 m, so this is = 32.5 , so they would
4×108
stretch to the moon and back 16 times.

What if you put each person in a room 5 m by Each room would have a volume of
5 m by 5 m? How much space would they all 5 × 5 × 5 = 125 m3, so for 6.5 × 109 people we
take up?
would need (6.5 × 109 ) × 125 = 8.1× 1011 m3.
This is a cube box with sides of length about
3
8.1×1011 = 9.3 km.
So a box about 10 km × 10 km × 10 km (not that
big) could contain rooms for all the people in
the world!

2.10.7 If all the ice in the Antarctic were to melt, how Answer:
much higher would the oceans rise? If it all melted, the rise would be about
3×108
= 0.06 km = 60 m.
Approximate volume of glacier ice in 5×109

Antarctica = 3 × 108 km3;

Approximate ocean surface area This ignores many important factors, such as the
= 5 × 109 km2. fact that water is slightly more dense than ice
and also that some of the ice is underwater.
(When floating ice melts, the water level
doesn’t change.)

2.10.8 Given that helium has a lifting power of about Answer:

1 gram per litre, how many fairground-type We can assume that each balloon is
balloons do you think it would take to lift an approximately a sphere with a diameter of
average person? about 30 cm. Therefore the volume of helium =
4
3
π r 3 = 43 π × 153 = 14130 cm3, or about 14 litres.
This value comes from the densities of helium So each balloon will lift about 14 g.
and air. 1 litre of helium has a mass of 0.18 g, An average person of mass 70 kg would
whereas 1 litre of air has a mass of 1.28 g. So by therefore need about 70 ÷ 0.014 = 5000 balloons
Archimedes’ principle the difference of about (rather a lot!).
0.01 N (equivalent to 1 g) is the resultant
upward force.

92 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 2.10.9 Comparing volume and surface area. Answer:
What have all these facts got in common? 1. The amount of heat that human beings can
store is roughly proportional to their
1. Babies need blankets to keep warm. volume, but the rate at which they lose heat
2. A mouse can fall a long way and not be to their surroundings is roughly
harmed. proportional to their surface area. Being
3. If an ant were enlarged to the size of an small, babies have a large ratio of surface
elephant it would collapse under its own area to volume.
weight. 2. The amount of energy the mouse has when
(That’s why elephants have it hits the ground is proportional to its mass
proportionately wider feet.) (or its volume) but the area of impact is
proportional to its surface area, so having a
Area scale factor of enlargement = x 2 ; lot of surface area for its volume (because
it’s small) helps.
Volume scale factor = x3 , and assuming
3. If the linear scale factor of enlargement was
constant density the mass would increase by
the same factor. x , then the ant’s weight would be x3 times
bigger, but its legs would be only x 2 times
(Stiletto heels damage some floors.) thicker, so they would buckle.
weight
Pressure on the ground = surface area
.

2.10.10 Design a bucket in the shape of a truncated This is a standard 2 gallon bucket.
cone that has a volume (capacity) of 9 litres.
If the radius at the bottom of the bucket is r , and
the radius at the top is a ( r < a ), and the height
Notice in this formula that if a = r we obtain of the bucket is h , then the volume V is given
V = π r 2 h , the formula for the volume of a by V = 13 π h(r 2 + ar + a 2 ) .
cylinder, and if a = 0 we obtain V = 13 π r 2 h , the Using values r = 9 cm, a = 12 cm and h = 26 cm
formula for the volume of a cone, as we should. gives V just over 9000 cm3, so this would hold 9
litres. (Many other possibilities.)

Why do you think buckets are not usually Truncated cones will stack inside one another,
cylinders? are stable and are easy to reach inside and
clean.

2.10.11 Archimedes (287-212 BC) said that if you put a Answers:

sphere inside the smallest cylinder that it will Let r be the radius of the sphere. Then the
just fit into, the volume of the sphere is 23 of height of the cylinder will be 2r , so
the volume of the cylinder. volume of cylinder = π r 2 × 2r = 2π r 3 and
Can you prove that he was right? volume of sphere = 43 π r 3 (standard result)
which is 2
3
of 2π r 3 .
What is the relationship between the two surface area of cylinder = 2π r × 2r = 4π r 2 and
surface areas? (Assume that the cylinder has
surface area of sphere = 4π r 2 (standard
open ends.)
result), so they’re equal.

What if the ends are closed instead? Then, surface area of cylinder =
4π r 2 + 2π r 2 = 6π r 2 ; i.e., 50% more than the
surface area of the sphere.

2.10.12 Archimedes’ Principle. Small insects and objects can sit on the surface
Why do some things float and others don’t? of water because of surface tension, and that is
a different phenomenon – they’re not really
Whether something will float depends both on “floating”.
its mass (or weight) and on its shape.
As an object sinks into the water, the water
pushes upwards on it and the force upwards is
equal to the weight of the water the object has
displaced. If the object can displace water with This will happen only if the average density of
as much weight as the total weight of the object the object is less than the density of water
before it is completely submerged then it will (1 g/cm3).
float.
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 93
2.10.13 Inside Faces. Answer:
If you make a 3 × 4 × 5 cuboid from 1 × 1 × 1 Imagine an x × y × z cuboid where x , y and z
cubes, how many faces of the cubes can’t you are all positive integers.
see? (You’re allowed to turn the cuboid Since each cube has 6 faces, altogether there
around to look at it.) are 6xyz faces. On the outside are 2xy visible
Start with a 1 × 1 line of cubes and build up
faces from one pair of parallel faces, and 2 xz
gradually.
and 2 yz from the other two pairs of parallel
faces. So the total number of inside faces must
be 6 xyz − 2 xy − 2 xz − 2 yz .
What if the cuboid is standing on a table, so
that you can’t see the faces underneath either? In this case, say it’s one of the x × y faces that is
standing on the table. Then you just lose sight of
If it were one of the xz or yz faces that was xy faces, so the total number of unseeable
standing on the table, then it would be the co- faces increases to 6 xyz − xy − 2 xz − 2 yz .
efficient of those terms that would change from
If y = z = 1 , then total = 3x − 2 , for example.
–2 to –1.
2.10.14 NEED tape measures, possibly other things as Answer: the value is not important; it’s the
well. Estimate the volume of a human being. process adopted that matters.

Practical methods: could be done at home as a Size will obviously depend on age of pupils.
homework; e.g., mark side of bath before and
after getting in (use something that will rub Theoretical approximation:
off!). Measure the difference in height and Head: 43 π r 3 = 43 π 103 = 4.2 litres;
multiply by the cross-sectional area of the
bath. Trunk: 20 × 50 × 50 = 50 litres;
Theoretical methods: e.g., ignore hands, feet, Arms: 2 × π r 2l = 2 × 3.14 × 42 × 50 = 5 litres;
etc., and treat the human body as a sphere on Legs: 2 × π r 2l = 2 × 3.14 × 62 × 80 = 18 litres;
top of a cuboid with two identical cylindrical So total estimate = 77 litres approx, which
arms and two bigger identical cylindrical seems sensible.
legs.
(See similar task in section 2.2.17.)
If you were flattened by a steamroller so that Area = Volume/height = 0.08/0.005 = 16 m2;
you were only 5 mm thick, how big a splat i.e., a 4 m by 4 m square!
would you make?! (Be cautious if some pupils may be upset by
this!)

2.10.15 Find out the world record for the number of Answer: About 20, depending on the type of
people who have simultaneously fitted inside telephone box and the exact rules about
a standard telephone box. whether you have to close the door or be able
(Possible homework.) to use the telephone!

Estimate a theoretical maximum. The dimensions are about 3 ft × 3 ft × 8 ft, so the

total volume = 72 cu ft (= 2 m3 approx).
Can estimate an average human volume (see Assuming the average volume of a human being
above) or estimate by taking average density as is 70 litres (see left), we would estimate a
1 kg/litre (the same as water, since we just maximum of about 2000/70 = about 30 people.
float) and an average human mass as 70 kg. So In practice a lot fewer.
our volume is about 70 litres.

2.10.16 When no-one is using it, the water in the Answer: We could assume that the pool is 50 m
swimming pool comes up to 50 cm below the by 25 m, so the area of the water’s surface
level of the floor outside the pool. How many = 50 × 25 = 1250 m2. We need to raise this by
people would have to get into the pool 50 cm, so the volume increase needed is
(completely submerged) to make it overflow? 1250 × 0.5 = 625 m3. If we take an average
(We’ll assume the people are still, not human volume as 70 litres, then it would take
jumping around and making waves!) 625 000/70 = about 9000 people! (Not very
practicable!)
The bottom of the pool actually slopes from
one end to the other so that one end is deeper It would make no difference since that extra
than the other. What difference would it make space will be filled with water throughout.
if we took this into account?
94 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
2.10.17 How many identical packets (cuboids Answers:
3 cm × 4 cm × 5 cm) can you fit into these 1. 1000; 2. 1020; 3. 1040, 4. 1040 (still), 5. 1080.
cuboid containers? Provided the packets fill the entire container
with no empty space, you can divide the
1. 30 cm × 40 cm × 50 cm; volumes; i.e., for question 1, 303××40×50
= 1000 , but
4×5
2. 30 cm × 40 cm × 51 cm;
3. 30 cm × 40 cm × 52 cm; a safer way (and necessary if there are going to
4. 30 cm × 40 cm × 53 cm; be any gaps) is to think how many rows you’ll
5. 30 cm × 40 cm × 54 cm. get along each dimension; i.e., 30
3
= 10 along
the 30 cm side, 40
4
= 10 along the 40 cm side
When the answers to these divisions are not and 50
5
= 10 along the 50 cm side, and
integers, you always need to round down. 10 × 10 × 10 = 1000.

1. 50; 2. 20; 3. 12; 4. 18.

Try these ones (same size packets):
1. 10 cm × 15 cm × 20 cm; In general, if the sides of the container have
2. 10 cm × 10 cm × 15 cm; lengths A , B and C , and the sides of the
3. 10 cm × 10 cm × 10 cm;
packets have lengths a , b and c , you need to
4. 10 cm × 11 cm × 12 cm.
work out the six products Aa Bb Cc , Aa Bc Cb ,
Try making up some puzzles like these. A B C
, A B C
, A B C
, and A B C
, in each
b a c b c a c a b c b a
case doing “integer division” (normal division
but rounding down and discarding the
remainder). You have to see which of these six
A spreadsheet makes this much easier. products gives the maximum number of
packets.

2.10.18 How long is a toilet roll? Answers:

You want to know how much paper there is on One option would be to weigh the roll and to
a toilet roll without unrolling the whole thing. weigh one sheet and do a division. (It would be
What measurements could you take? more accurate to count off 20 sheets, say, to
weigh and then divide by 20.) To do this, you
would need an accurate balance and you would
have to weigh a cardboard tube separately and
subtract this from the total. You would calculate
how many sheets were on the roll and then
multiply this by the length of one sheet.

A second option would be to measure the

thickness of one sheet (again, you would
measure 20, say, and divide by 20) and the
thickness of the roll, and divide to find out how
many layers there are on the roll.
This number can be multiplied by the average
circumference 12 ( R + r ) , where R is the outer
radius and r is the radius of the cardboard
Another way of arriving at this formula is to
tube.
think about the area of the end of the roll (the
Since the thickness of paper on the roll is
cross-sectional area), which is π R 2 − π r 2 ( R − r ) , and if t is the thickness of one sheet,
= π ( R 2 − r 2 ) , and this will be the same as the R−r
thickness of one sheet multiplied by the length then the number of layers on the roll is so
t
of the whole roll.
R−r R+r
π (R2 − r 2 ) the length of the roll is × 2π
So length of the roll is again. t 2
t
π ( R2 − r 2 )
= .
t

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 95

2.11 Plans and Elevations

• If you can lay your hands on some real architect plans/blueprints, that would show the relevance of
this topic. Or pupils could bring in diagrams from instructions for putting together some object such
as a bookcase, a climbing-frame or a model. Notice how hard it would be without the diagrams.
• Pupils could look at home for optical illusions that depend on different points of view. Perhaps there
are artists who have exploited views of common objects from unusual angles in their work.
• You may be able to find satellite photographs and aerial photographs on the internet – perhaps of the
local area.
• Pupils with experience of playing certain types of computer games may have an advantage with this
topic!

2.11.1 You can start with “A Mexican on a bicycle”, If pupils have access to a camera they could
photograph “common objects” viewed from
unusual angles to produce a set of puzzles.
(For each object you also want a view from a
more usual angle to use as an “answer”.)

and “A Mexican frying an egg”! Skip the Mexican idea if it might offend
someone.

Pupils may know of other drawings like this.

2.11.2 NEED interlocking cubes, “What are these Answers: There are 29 pentacubes altogether.
objects?” sheets. The 7 used are shown below.

1 2 3 4
Some pupils (and teachers!) find this sort of task
very hard.

Objects with planes of symmetry (how many in

brackets): 1 (2); 2 (1); 3 (1); 5 (1); 6 (1). 5 6 7
Objects 4 and 7 are the only “chiral” objects
among these; they are non-superimposable
mirror images of each other (like enantiomers
in Chemistry).

2.11.3 Escher (1898-1972) drawings are very Many books have suggestions of impossible
impressive to look at. drawings.
Pupils could attempt some “impossible
drawings” on isometric paper.

2.11.4 Scale Drawings.

This topic could be tied in to work on scale
drawing by making “architect’s plans” for a
room or floor at school, at home or elsewhere.

96 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 What are these Objects?
All of these objects are made out of 5 interlocking cubes.

There are three different views of each object.

Try to make the object and draw it on isometric paper.

front view left side view plan view

1

Which objects have a plane of symmetry?

Which two objects are mirror images of each other?

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 97

2.12 Similarity and
Congruence
• These terms can apply to plane shapes or to solids: similar means that one shape/solid is an
enlargement of the other; congruent means that the shapes/solids are identical (a special case of
similarity with scale factor 1). Reflections (turning the shape over) count as congruent.
Pupils may want to use the equals sign to indicate congruence (e.g., ∆ ABC = ∆ PQR ), and this might
be an opportunity to discuss whether = always means the same thing in maths or not.
• For material on similarity, see section 2.13.

2.12.1 Two triangles will be congruent if one of these There is much logical thinking involved here.
conditions is true.
1. the three sides of one of the triangles are
the same as the three sides of the other
(SSS); If all three angles match (AAA) then the
2. two sides and the angle in between are the triangles must be similar and might be
same (SAS); congruent but needn’t be.
3. two angles and the side in between are the
same (ASA); If two sides match (SS), the third side can be
4. the triangles are right-angled and the anything between the sum of the two given
hypotenuse and one other side match sides and their difference, so there are infinitely
(RHS). many possibilities.
One side and any two angles (SAA) is
equivalent to ASA because in a triangle the
angles must add up to 180°, so given two angles
Why are these the only conditions that you can always work out what the third must be,
guarantee congruence? but the angles and sides must correspond.

The crucial case to think through is ASS (the

angle isn’t between the two given sides).
x y Here, what happens depends on how long the
second side is relative to the first.
If the angle is θ , the first side has length x and
θ
the second side has length y , then we get the
diagram on the left.
If y < x sin θ , the sides don’t join up and there is
no such triangle.
If y > x sin θ , then there are two possible
triangles depending on which side of the
vertical dashed line the third side goes.
If y = x sin θ , then there is just one possible
triangle and it’s right-angled (this is the RHS
possibility mentioned already).

2.12.2 Find some shapes that can be cut up into two Answers: (number of similar shapes produced
or more pieces which are all mathematically in brackets)
similar to the original shape. • any right-angled isos. triangle (2, 3, 4, …);
Start with triangles. • any equilateral triangle (4, 7, 9, 10, …);
• any parall’m, including rectangles, with
sides in the ratio 1: 2 (2) (like A-size
paper);
• any parall’m at all, including rhombuses,
rectangles and squares (4, 9, 16, …);
• special trapeziums, e.g., see left (4)
• lots more possibilities
98 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
2.13 Symmetry

• Pupils need to be able to recognise and describe fully a transformation that’s already happened.
Certain information is needed to describe a transformation fully:
reflection rotation translation enlargement
where is the mirror where is the centre of how far and in what where is the centre of
line? rotation? direction has the shape enlargement?
give its equation if on what is the angle of moved? what is the scale
co-ordinate axes rotation? give the vector factor?
what is the sense of the distance to the right
rotation? distance up
positive (anti-clockwise)
or negative (clockwise)

For enlargement you can draw a scale factor number line:

–2 –1 0 1 2
reduction
enlargement with
with reduction enlargement
inversion
inversion
no shape
A scale factor of 1 leaves the shape unchanged; a scale factor of –1 inverts the shape but doesn’t
change its area.
• Pupils need to be able to perform a specified transformation of a shape. It’s good to develop a culture
where pupils check their own drawings by measuring lengths and angles so that they rarely need to
ask “is this right?” Accuracy of ± 1 mm and ± 1° should be the aim.
• Marking is much easier when drawings are done on co-ordinate axes. Pupils can then write down the
co-ordinates of the points of the image shape(s) and it is easy to see whether these are correct or not.
Otherwise the only quick way to mark drawings is to do the accurate drawing yourself, photocopy
onto an acetate (this is much easier – although more expensive - than trying to do an accurate
drawing using acetate pens) and then place this over the pupil’s work.
You can set up some kind of rule for marks; e.g., within 1° or 1 mm, 2 marks; within 2° or 2 mm,
1 mark.
• Coloured acetate is available from art shops, and although it’s expensive you can do a lot with just
one sheet. You can cut out various shapes and place onto an acetate of 1 cm × 1 cm squares (available
in section 1.23). This is particularly helpful with visualising translations. Dynamic Geometry software
can make this even slicker.
• Small mirrors can be useful, and tracing paper is more or less essential for many pupils.

2.13.1 Reflections.
Completing the other half of pictures of Good for displays.
animals/aliens, etc. can be useful practice.
Diagonal mirror lines are sometimes easier to
do by rotating the paper so that the line goes
The reflected image is always congruent to the away from you. You need to count the squares
original object. (or diagonals of squares) or measure in a
direction perpendicular to the mirror line.
“Diagonal” mirror lines that are not at 45° are
very difficult to do accurately unless the shape
is well chosen.

What stays the same and what changes in a Same: size, shape, lengths of sides, area,
reflection? angles;
Different: position, “orientation”,
“handedness”.
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 99
 2.13.2 NEED “Symmetrical Squares” sheets. Several possible answers.

2.13.3 Introduce by drawing axes from –6 to 6 in Recaps plotting co-ordinates.

both directions on the board.
Plot the co-ordinates A(1,1), B(1,4), C(2,4), Or you can use a scalene right-angled triangle.
D(2,2), E(3,2) and F(3,1) and join them up to You don’t want to use anything with symmetry
get an L-shape. because that sometimes makes it hard to see if
the shape has been changed or not, although so
I’m going to add 3 to all the coordinates to get long as the vertices are labelled clearly this
six new points. So A becomes (4,4). What do does not have to be a problem.
you think the new shape will be like?
We’re adding 3 to the x -number (the first Many will think shape will be stretched or
number) and 3 to the y -number (the second enlarged.
number). 3
Actually it’s just a translation .
3
So transforming the co-ordinates ( x, y ) into
What if leave the x -numbers alone and make 3
( x + 3, y + 3) is the translation .
the y -numbers into minus what they are? 3
i.e., ( x, y ) ( x, − y )

Put up a list of possible co-ordinate

transformations. Pupils can invent their own. This time it’s a reflection in the x -axis.
They could work in groups so as to cover all
these as a class in a reasonable amount of
time.
Make a table of results. ( x, y ) transformation
( x + 3, y + 3) translation 3 to the right, 3 up
( x, − y ) reflection in y = 0
Try to generalise; e.g.,
a ( − x, y ) reflection in x = 0
( x + a, y + b) is a translation
b ( − x, − y ) rotation 180° about (0,0)
(even if a or b are negative). ( y, x ) reflection in y = x
( y, − x) rotation –90° about (0,0)
(ax, ay ) is an enlargement, scale factor a (− y, x) rotation +90° about (0,0)
centred on the origin.
(− y, − x) reflection in y = − x
Try out more complicated ones; e.g., 1
( x + 1, y − 3) translation
( x, y ) (3x − 2,3 y + 1) . −3
An enlargement, scale factor 3 about the origin enlargement, scale factor 2,
followed by a translation 2 units to the left and 1 centre (0,0)
(2 x, 2 y )
unit up. [Need vertical axis up to 8
for this one.]

2.13.4 An alternative approach is to use Dynamic The software may allow other transformations
Geometry software to allow pupils to explore such as stretch and shear.
different transformations on a shape of their
choice and investigate what happens to the Some pupils might like to investigate matrices
co-ordinates of the vertices under each to try to work out the effects of putting different
different transformation. numbers in the four different “slots”.

2.13.5 Is a human face symmetrical? There is more or less a vertical line of

symmetry, but not exactly. If it were, our faces
would look the same in the mirror, and they
don’t. Some studies suggest that highly
symmetrical faces are the most beautiful.
What’s the minimum change you’d have to
make to a human face to give it some You could aim for order 2 rotational symmetry,
rotational symmetry?! and even that is not easy.
(Pupils can sketch their ideas.)

100 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 2.13.6 Why does a mirror swap round left and right Answer: This is quite a tricky one.
but it doesn’t swap round up and down? It’s really because we imagine our mirror
I mean why is my left hand where my right image standing (upright) next to us.
hand is (and vice versa), but my head isn’t If you’re facing a mirror straight-on, every point
where my feet are (and vice versa)? is reflected exactly in front of the original point.

Does a mirror really know which way is up? H

H
(What we mean by “up” is really something L R
like “the opposite way to gravity” – how could L R
a mirror know about gravity?) F
F
(Black for the person; grey for the reflection;
H= head, F = feet, L = left hand, R = right hand.)

But to compare the original with the image, you

have to turn one of them over so you can place
F them side by side. We tend to rotate ourselves
mentally about a vertical axis, and that gives
L R the diagram below,
H H H
H
R L L R
L R
F F
F
where R and L have swapped, but that’s really
an arbitrary choice.
If we rotated about a horizontal axis, we would
get the opposite result (see left) where the head
and feet have swapped places.

2.13.7 Rotations To explain order of rotation you can use

Order of rotational symmetry is the number of interlocking cubes which have holes in the
times the shape will fit onto itself as it rotates middle. A pencil will fit through horizontally so
through 360°. that you can rotate the object about that axis.
Order 1 means no rotational symmetry.
A circle has infinite rotational symmetry, Order is always a positive integer. (Actually, in
because you can stop it at any angle and it fits quantum mechanics some particles – for
exactly onto itself. example, an electron – have so-called “spin” of
1
2
, and this means they have to “rotate twice”,
720˚, to get back to where they started!)
To rotate a shape without using tracing paper it
often helps to join the centre of rotation to one
If using tracing paper, “centre of rotation” can
of the vertices and rotate this line. You can do
be seen as the point on the tracing paper where
this for each vertex if necessary.
you put your pencil – the point that doesn’t
move – everything else revolves around it.

Lots of possibilities – you can lose the mirror

Draw me a shape with order 6 rotational
symmetry by adding tails or flags to something
symmetry, but no reflection symmetry.
with 6-fold symmetry.
e.g.,

You may want to avoid unintentionally drawing

Swastikas.

What stays the same and what changes in a Same: size, shape, lengths of sides, angles,
rotation? area;
Different: orientation, position.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 101

 2.13.8 NEED a set of circuit symbols from a Answers: among the most common symbols,
Physics/Electronics book. you find these symmetries:
What kind of symmetry do the symbols have? • no symmetry: variable resistor, variable
capacitor, transistor, switch;
Line symmetry may be parallel or • line symmetry only: cell, ammeter,
perpendicular to the wire direction. voltmeter, earth, diode, inductor, lamp
(modern symbol);
• rotational symmetry (> order 1) only:
source of alternating current;
• line symmetry and rotational symmetry
(> order 1): connecting wire, lamp (old-
fashioned cross symbol), resistor,
transformer, fuse, capacitor.

You can do the same with hazard warning “Toxic” has line symmetry, and “harmful” and
symbols (Science department) (ignore the “radioactive” have both line and rotational.
writing underneath the symbol). “Oxidising” almost has line symmetry but not
quite because of the “flames”!

Highway code road signs are another • line symmetry only: crossroads, dual
possibility, but most have no symmetry. carriageway ends, chevrons, road narrows
Generally you should ignore the writing on both sides, uneven road, traffic signals,
underneath and possibly ignore the shape of hump bridge, level crossing with barrier,
the sign itself (triangle, circle, etc.) as well. general danger, tunnel, low-flying air-craft,
road humps;
• line symmetry and rotational symmetry:
general warning, roundabout (line
symmetry only approximate here).
Signs from music notation. • line symmetry only: accents, ties, pause,
crescendo, diminuendo, up/down bow
(string players), alto/tenor clef;
• rotational symmetry only: sharp sign, natural
sign, turn, mordent;
• line symmetry and rotational symmetry:
breve, semibreve (and their rests), 5-line
stave, bar line, double bar line, repeat
marks, staccato dots, double-sharp sign.

2.13.9 NEED crosswords from newspapers (collect You could make a display out of this.
for homework). Sort them according to their
symmetry.

2.13.10 NEED pencil crayons (or just pencil), sheets. Answers:

Colour And Symmetry. Colouring the hexagon in the centre never
Colour in the shapes to give them rotational makes any difference so long as it’s all the same
symmetry of colour.

1. order 1 See sheet for answers.

2. order 2
3. order 3

What other orders of rotational symmetry are None.

possible?
What is the minimum number of different One (and white).
colours you need to use?

Do any of the finished shapes have any line No.

symmetry?
If using different colours, be careful not to
embarrass anyone who is colour-blind.

102 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.13.11 Translations. Translation vectors are not that difficult and are
Pupils need to be clear that the vector defines a less cumbersome way of describing
the movement of each point to its image point; translations than using words.
this isn’t necessarily the same as the “gap” They are best defined as
between the object and image shapes. distance to the right
.
distance up
(Notice that this is “upside down” compared
with the way gradient is defined.)
What stays the same and what changes in a
translation? Same: size, shape, lengths of sides, area,
angles, orientation;
Different: position.

2.13.12 Combined Transformations. Answers:

1. I’m thinking of a point. If I translate it by 1. (–2, anything); i.e., any point on the line
4 x = −2 ;
, I get to the same point as if I reflect 2. either (1,4) or (–4,–1);
0
3. (4,2)
the point I’m thinking of in the y-axis. 4. (–3,1)
Where is the point?
(There is more than one possibility.) Solve these by doing rough sketches.
2. I’m thinking of a point. If I translate the
3
point by , I get to the same point as if
−3
I reflect the point I’m thinking of in the
lines y = x . Where could the point be?

3. I’m thinking of a point. If I translate the

−2
point by , that’s equivalent to a
−6
rotation of it by 90° clockwise about the
origin. Where could the point be this time?
In general, for questions 3 and 4, if a translation
4 a
4. This time if I translate my point by , is equivalent to a rotation 90° clockwise
2 b
that’s equivalent to rotating it by 90° about the origin, then the co-ordinates of the
clockwise about the origin. Where is this point have to be (− 12 (a + b), 12 (a − b)) .
point?

2.13.13 Enlargement.
What does “enlargement” mean? “Gets bigger” – so draw a 10 × 2 rectangle;
Draw a 3 × 2 rectangle on the board. “Gets bigger both ways” – so draw a 10 × 10;
“Gets bigger both ways by the same amount” –
so draw a 4 × 3 rectangle, etc. (be awkward!).
Why are none of these proper enlargements?
It has to get the same proportion (fraction)
If the “scale factor” is different in different bigger both ways.
directions, you get a stretch. You wouldn’t be Proportional thinking is always hard.
happy with this if your photos got “enlarged”
like this – it isn’t a proper enlargement.

What stays the same and what changes in an Same: shape, angles, orientation;
enlargement? Different: size, position, lengths of sides, area.

A reduction sometimes counts as a (fractional) The scale factor number-line may be helpful
enlargement in maths. here (see beginning of this section).

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 103

2.13.14 Accurate Enlargements. In fact there isn’t always a centre of
You don’t always need to have a centre of enlargement even when a shape has been
enlargement to draw an accurate enlarged properly, because the new shape
enlargement; e.g., you can measure the sides could have a different orientation from the
and angles, keep the angles the same and original shape.
multiply the lengths of sides by the scale
factor. Scale factor (SF) can be positive or negative.

Initially it’s useful to use photocopied sheets Emphasise that we make every measurement
so that you can be sure the enlarged shape from the centre of enlargement. (If you measure
will fit on nicely (see sheet). from the corners of the original shape instead
you get a SF + 1 enlargement.)
What difference does it make if we move the
centre of enlargement? Pupils should check their own drawings by
Same image shape except in a different place. measuring the sides in the new shape (they
(Centre of enlargement can even be inside the should be SF × the lengths of the corresponding
shape or on one of the vertices.) sides in the old shape), the angles (should be
the same) and checking that the orientation is
Four possible “kinds” of scale factor (SF): the same.
1. SF >1; shape gets bigger;
2. 0 < SF < 1; shape gets smaller;
3. SF < –1; shape gets bigger and inverted; See the SF number-line at the beginning of this
4. –1 < SF < 0; shape gets smaller and section.
inverted. Probably best to do in this order.

2.13.15 Enlargement. “Aspect Ratios”, TV/cinema. Answers:

A normal TV screen has an “aspect ratio” of % viewed = 4×1
= 57% , so 43% is missing.
2.35×3
4:3 (its size is 4 along by 3 up).
(You see all of the vertical direction but lose the
If you display a widescreen movie (2.35:1) so
two ends in the horizontal direction.)
that the whole screen is filled with picture,
what % of the picture do you lose?

What about if you view the whole picture (so Same as before; 43% of the screen is black.
you don’t miss anything) “letterbox” style.
(Widescreen isn’t always as “wide”: 1.85:1 is
What % of the screen is wasted with “black
common, as is 16:9, which is normal theatre
bars”?
screen dimensions.)

Which do you think is better? Film buffs tend to prefer to see everything the
director intended, even if that means having a
smaller picture.

What if you have a high-definition TV (16:9)? This time you lose only 24% of the picture (or
waste 24% of the screen).

2.13.16 NEED compasses, A4 plain paper.

Constructing a Golden Rectangle.
Take piece of A4 paper, landscape
orientation, and draw a square 18 cm by
18 cm in the bottom left corner.
Split the square into two congruent rectangles
with a vertical line.
Place the point of your compasses at the
bottom of this line and stretch the pencil up to
the top right corner of the square.
Draw an arc down from here until it reaches
the bottom of the paper. The shaded rectangle is called the “Golden
This point along the bottom side is the position Rectangle”. Its sides are in the ratio 1: φ where
of the bottom right end of the Golden
Rectangle.
φ = 1.61803… ( 1+2 5 , see below).
From here, draw a line 18 cm long vertically (Pythagoras’ Theorem gives the radius of the
up the page. Then draw a line to meet the left arc as 9 5 , so the bottom length is 9(1 + 5) .)
side of the paper.

104 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.13.17 NEED A4 white paper. Golden Ratio. Answer: People tend to choose the ones nearest
Suitable homework. Draw 8 different-shaped to 3:2 or thereabouts. Some say that the
rectangles on a blank piece of A4 paper (or rectangle most pleasing to the eye is the
cut out 8 different rectangles). Ask people to Golden Rectangle with sides in the Golden
say which one or two look the “nicest” – “most Ratio ( 1: φ , see section 2.13.16). Renaissance
pleasing to the eye”. artists may have used this to construct paintings.

2.13.18 NEED scrap paper, scissors. Answer:

I take a rectangle and fold over the shorter 2:1 will give 2 squares, so certainly not. If the
end so that it lies along the longer side. In this sides are in the ratio x :1 ( x > 1 ), then
way I can mark off a square from the end. I cut x −1 1
off the square and the rectangle I’m left with, algebraically = , so x( x − 1) − 1 = 0 or
1 x
although it’s obviously smaller, is the same
shape (same dimensions) as the rectangle I x 2 − x − 1 = 0 , and the solutions are
began with. Can you find a rectangle that will 1 ± 1 − −4 1+ 5
x= , or ,
do that. Will a 2:1 rectangle work? 2 2
since x must be positive.
So x = 1.61803...
This is the “divine proportion” or “Golden
Ratio”. As indicated above, it is squared by
(See task involving A-size paper in section
adding 1 ( x 2 = x + 1 ).
1.10.6.)
The ratio of a term in the Fibonacci sequence
(See section 1.19.10 for a task involving the (1170-1250) to the previous term gets closer to
Fibonacci series.) the Golden Ratio as you go to higher and higher
terms.

2.13.18 NEED A3 piece of paper showing a large Pupils can take measurements from it and try to
footprint or “pawprint”. What can you say predict things like height, mass, length of
about the size of the animal that could have stride, the tallest wall it could climb over, how
produced this?! (Imagine we discovered it much food it might eat per day, etc.
outside school in the morning.)

2.13.19 On squared board or 1 cm × 1 cm squared Suitable for reviewing the transformations topic.
acetate, draw two separate 2 × 2 squares.

Lots of possibilities: translation, rotation,

reflection followed by translation, reflection
followed by a different reflection, etc.

Pupils can try to describe the transformations as

The white square has become the grey precisely as possible.
square. What’s happened to it, apart from the
change in colour?

Label the white square ABCD. How would you

have to label the grey square (where would The white square is the object; the grey square
you put A’, B’, C’ and D’ to make it each of the is the image.
transformations pupils have suggested?

2.13.20 You could begin a lesson by writing You can give instructions in this way to pupils at
something like this on the board: the start of a lesson on reflections; e.g.,

Be prepared to help those who may find this

very hard.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 105

 Symmetrical Squares
In each drawing, shade in exactly 3 more squares so that the whole drawing ends up
with exactly 2 lines of symmetry.

1 2

3 4

5 6

7 8

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 107

 Symmetrical Squares ANSWERS
In each drawing, shade in exactly 3 more squares so that the whole drawing ends up with
exactly 2 lines of symmetry.

There are many possibilities; only one answer is shown for each question.
All of the shaded squares would have to be the same colour.

1
2

3
4

5
6

7
8

108 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Colour And Symmetry
Colour these shapes so that they have different orders of rotational symmetry.

Order ______ Order ______ Order ______

Order ______ Order ______ Order ______

Order ______ Order ______ Order ______

Order ______ Order ______ Order ______

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 109
 Colour And Symmetry ANSWERS
Colour these shapes so that they have different orders of rotational symmetry.

These are the possibilities using just one colour (and white).
In each case, the shaded and white areas could be swapped (making a “negative”), usually
giving a different answer with the same order of rotational symmetry.

Order 6 Order 1 Order 1 (“ortho”)

Order 1 (“meta”) Order 2 (“para”) Order 1

Order 1 Order 1 Order 3

These two (above) have “negatives” which are the same as

themselves but they are not the same as each other.

The names “ortho”, “meta” and “para” refer to substitution patterns in derivatives of the
chemical molecule benzene, which has a planar hexagonal shape and 6-fold symmetry.

110 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 Drawing Accurate Enlargements
Enlarge these shapes as accurately as you can, using O as the centre of enlargement.
None of the enlargements should go off the page.

1 Scale factor 2

2 Scale factor 3

3 Scale factor 2

4 Scale factor 1.5

O

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 111

 Drawing Accurate Enlargements ANSWERS
Enlarge these shapes as accurately as you can, using O as the centre of enlargement.
None of the enlargements should go off the page.

(You could photocopy this sheet onto an acetate and place it over the pupils’ work to mark.)

1 Scale factor 2

2 Scale factor 3

3 Scale factor 2

4 Scale factor 1.5

O

112 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.14 Tessellations

• A misconception here is that the interior angles in shapes that tessellate have something to do with
the factors of 360. That cannot be right, because 360 is an arbitrary number that we choose to divide a
whole turn into. We could have used 100, or 2π (could mention radians here), or 359, which is prime.
See sheet for an explanation of why only some polygons tessellate.
2.14.1 Polyominoes. Answers:
Obviously dominoes will tessellate because All triominoes, tetrominoes, pentominoes and
they are just rectangles. hexominoes tessellate.
What about both of the triominoes? From heptominoes onwards they don’t all
What about the tetrominoes? tessellate.
And so on …
See section 2.2.9 for how many of each of the
polyominoes there are.

2.14.2 What kinds of triangles tessellate? Answer: all triangles tessellate, because any
two congruent triangles will make a
parallelogram if you put a pair of
corresponding sides together, and
parallelograms tessellate.

2.14.3 What kinds of quadrilaterals tessellate? Answer: again all will, even concave ones.

2.14.4 Design a tessellating shape. You can “force” it This can make good display work.
to tessellate by starting with something that
certainly tessellates (e.g., a parallelogram) Christmas trees are possible.
and doing opposite things to opposite sides
(e.g., cut out a triangle from one side and add
it on to the opposite parallel side).

2.14.5 NEED cardboard or plastic polygons. It really is worth using cardboard (the thicker
(You could use the polygon shapes from the better) and not paper to make templates,
section 2.1.) because they are much easier to draw round.
Draw round them and see which ones you can You can get a lot out of one A4 sheet of card.
get to tessellate.
To start with, try only one type of regular
polygon in each pattern. You should find 3
“regular tessellations”. (See sheet.)

2.14.6 NEED Escher (1898-1972) drawings (see Remarkable examples of intricate tessellations.
books).

2.14.7 Where have you seen beautiful tessellations? Answers (suggestions):

Islamic art, mosaics (are there some in school
or could people bring in photos?).

2.14.8 Where are tessellations not just pretty but Answers (continued):
useful? 3. squared/isometric paper;
4. rigid bridge structures (equilateral
Answers (suggestions): triangles);
1. bee-hive: very sensible structure (rigid); 5. kitchen tiles (no gaps is important, because
2. some molecular structures (e.g., graphite is water would get through).
made up of sheets of tessellating hexagons 6. paving slabs, brick walls.
of carbon atoms);

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 113

 Tessellations
A tessellation is a pattern of shapes which cover all of the surface with no gaps and no
overlapping.

There are 3 Regular Tessellations – all the shapes are the same regular polygon and all the
vertices are the same.

Equilateral Triangles Squares Hexagons

180(n − 2)
In a regular polygon with n sides, each interior angle is .
n
180(n − 2)m
If m (a positive integer) of them meet at a point, then = 360 , and this simplifies to
n
m(n − 2) 2n 2n
= 2 , or m = . So if is an integer, the regular polygon will tessellate.
n n−2 n−2
This happens only when n = 3, 4 or 6 (equilateral triangles, squares and hexagons).

There are 8 Semiregular Tessellations – all the shapes are regular polygons, but they’re not
all the same regular polygon. All the vertices are still the same.

3,3,3,4,4 3,3,4,3,4 3,3,3,3,6 3,6,3,6

3,12,12 4,8,8 3,4,6,4 4,6,12

Every vertex has the same arrangement of regular polygons around it.
Going clockwise or anticlockwise around a vertex, the number of sides on each of the
polygons present make the sequences of numbers above (e.g., 3,3,3,4,4 means that at each
vertex you have triangle-triangle-triangle-square-square).

114 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.15 Dimensions and Units

• Although the practical everyday relevance is clear, this can be a dull topic unless there is some
purpose to converting quantities from one unit to another. This topic works best by combining with
others; e.g., standard form, volume/area, estimation, etc. There are some suggested problems
below.
• It’s hard to say exactly what “dimensions” are. You could ask pupils if they know what the “d” stands
for in “3d” and then see what they think there are “3” of. The answer is something like “mutually
perpendicular directions”. Mathematicians often talk about 4 or more dimensions. In Maths, extra
dimensions often don’t make things that much harder to calculate, but it gets harder/impossible to
visualise!

2.15.1 Conversion graphs. Bringing along foreign coins adds interest. See
Find out currency conversion rates from if pupils can identify the country and estimate
newspapers or the internet. how much the coin is worth in our money.

Pupils can draw, for example, value in French It’s much easier to be a millionaire in some
Francs against value in British Pounds on one countries than in others!
graph, and German Marks against British
Pounds on another. Pupils can then convert
Francs to Marks using one graph after another Could discuss stock-markets, inflation, etc.
(pick several values) – the resulting graph of
Marks against Francs should also be a straight
line through the origin.

Are conversion graphs always straight lines? Not necessarily; e.g., dropping a ruler between
someone’s fingers to measure their reaction
d time – the graph to convert cm to seconds is a
(Actually, time in seconds = , where d = curve.
490
distance fallen in cm.) (Each 1 cm fallen counts for less as time goes
on, because the ruler is speeding up.)
Do they always go through the origin? Again, not necessarily; e.g., °C to °F.

2.15.2 Which is bigger, an imperial ton or a metric Answer: Imperial is spelt “ton”; metric is spelt
tonne? Are they different in the UK and the “tonne”.
US? (Could find out for homework.) A UK ton is 2240 lb (a so-called “long ton” or
“gross ton”), whereas a US ton (a “short ton” or
“net ton”) is only 2000 lb.
So the order is
UK ton > metric tonne > US ton. Since a metric tonne is 1000 kg (anywhere!),
and there are 2.205 lb in a kg, a metric tonne is
What about gallons? 2205 lb, so this is in between (see left).
Similarly, US pints are less than UK ones, but US
fluid ounces are more, since in the US there are A UK gallon is 4.55 litres, whereas a US gallon is
16 fluid ounces in a pint, whereas in the UK only 3.79 litres.
there are 20!

2.15.3 Estimate the total mass of everyone in the Answer: Assume an average pupil weighs 50
room? kg. A class of 30 would weigh 30 × 50 kg = 1500
kg or 1.5 tonne.

What about the total mass of everyone in Depends on the size of the school, obviously.
school assembly? (Be cautious if anyone might be sensitive about
this task.)
Instant Maths Ideas: 2 115
2.15.4 Find out how high up aeroplanes typically fly. Answers: (Note that 5280 ft = 1 mile.)
• aeroplanes: e.g., 30 000 ft = 6 miles
How high are the tallest buildings? (approx) (The SR71 spy-plane flew at an
altitude of 16 miles, but the pilots had to
How high up are satellites? wear space-suits!);
• tallest buildings: (lots of debate over
How far away is the moon/the sun? exactly what counts) around 500 m or nearly
2000 ft;
• satellites: anywhere from 100’s of miles to
tens of thousands of miles; e.g.,
geostationary satellites are at 22 223 miles
(the further out they are the longer they last
because there’s less material for them to
bump into);
• moon (a natural satellite): 240 000 miles;
Can you draw a scale diagram to illustrate? • sun (a star): 93 000 000 miles.
(possible homework) It’s impossible to draw them all on a linear
scale.

Find out how astronomers measure distances? The mean distance from the earth to the sun is
called an “astronomical unit” (AU),
1.5 × 1011 m, or 9.3 × 107 miles. For example,
astronomers might say that the distance of
mercury from the sun is 0.39 AU, whereas for
Pluto it is 40 AU.
“Light years” (ly) are another way of
measuring distance (not time); a light year is
the distance light travels in a vacuum in one
year and is 1016 m approx.
Astronomers also use “parsecs” (pc), and
1 parsec = 3.26 ly = 3 × 1016 m.

What about leagues and fathoms? They’re used in sea-travel.

1 fathom = 6 feet;
1 league = 3 miles
(1 nautical league = 3 nautical miles;
a nautical mile = 1.15 land miles.)

2.15.5 Estimate the number of tubes of toothpaste Answer: Assume that there are 60 million
used per year in the UK. people in the UK and that everyone brushes
their teeth on average once a day (some more,
What assumptions do you have to make? some less). Assume all tubes hold 75 g
toothpaste and that everyone uses 1 g for each
brushing.
Therefore, for 365 days (leap years make no
significant difference) we’ll use
365 × 1 × 60 × 106 g = 2 × 1010 g, which
corresponds to 2 × 1010 ÷ 75 tubes = 3 × 109,
3 billion tubes per year (approx).

2.15.6 How many pencils would it take to stretch Answers:

across a football pitch from one goal to the Take an average pencil as 15 cm long.
other? Football pitch = 100 m long, so about 700.
How many to stretch to the top of the Eiffel Eiffel Tower = 324 m high, so about 2000.
Tower? A mile = 1600 m, so about 11 000 pencils.
How many to stretch a mile? Equator = 2π r where r = radius of the earth =
How many to go all the way round the world at 6.4 × 106 m, so equator = 4 × 107 m so about
the equator? 3 × 108 pencils (300 million).
How many to go to the moon and back? Average distance to the moon = 4 × 108 m, so
twice this is 8 × 108 m, so about 5 × 109 pencils
(5 billion).

116 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

2.15.7 Dimensions. You can’t do this topic until pupils are familiar
Tell me a kind of shape and how to work out with finding areas and volumes of a number of
its area. We’ll write it as a formula. different shapes/solids.
e.g., square: l 2 ; triangle: 12 bh ; etc.
Record in two columns on the board: “area
Now tell me some solids and how to work out
formulas”; “volume formulas”.
their volumes.
What do you notice?
Area is always found by multiplying two lengths
together (possibly also multiplying by a fixed
number); Volume is always a length multiplied
If we write this as L2 and L3 , then this just by a length multiplied by length, or an area
means “some length” squared/cubed. multiplied by a length (and possibly multiplied
by a constant).

The formula for the area of an ellipse is one of

π ab , since this is the only formula with L2
these. Which one?
dimensions. ( a is half the length of the major
π abc ; π ab ; π a 2 b ; π ab 2 ; π (a + b) axis (longest diameter) and b is half the length
of the minor axis (shortest diameter).)

It’s worth reinforcing the point that A B does

not mean that B A . Right formula right Using dimensions never helps us to get the
dimensions, but right dimensions right constant right, for example.
formula. So dimensions would never tell us to put in the
A B does mean that B ′ A′ (where B ′ π in the formula for the area of the ellipse.
means “not-B”). So dimensions wrong
formula definitely wrong. In Mechanics, you also use M and T for mass
and time. Other areas of Science require
temperature θ , current A and even luminous
intensity I . Most things can be made up from
combinations of these, or else they’re
dimensionless (e.g., angles).

2.15.8 Check out the “dimensional soundness” of See Physics books for definitions of these
some Physics formulas; e.g., quantities.
• Newton’s 2nd Law: F = ma
[ F ] = Newtons • You can think of this formula as defining a
−2 Newton as the force necessary to accelerate
[ma ] = MLT
a 1 kg mass by 1 m/s2;
so 1 Newton is defined as 1 kg m/s2;
• [at ] = LT −2T = LT −1 ;
• constant acceleration formulas; e.g.,
v = u + at and v 2 = u 2 + 2as ; • [ Fs ] = MLT −2 L = ML2T −2 = Joule;
• work done and energy formulas; e.g., • 1
2
mv 2 = M ( LT −1 ) 2 = ML2T −2 ;
W = Fs and E = 12 mv 2 ; 1 1
l L 2
1 2

l • 2π = = =T ;
• the time period of a pendulum: T = 2π ; g LT −2 T −2
g
• wave motion: v = f λ ;
• [ f λ ] = T −1L = LT −1 = [v ] ;
• [u ] = [v] = [ f ] ;
1 1 1
• lenses: + = ;
u v f ML2T −2
• [V ] = = A × ML2T −3 A−2 , etc.;
• electricity; e.g., V = IR , P = VI , Q = CV ; AT
• magnetism; e.g., T = BANI cos α ;
Gm1m2 QQ Dimensions can help with remembering the
• fields; e.g., F = − 2
, F = 1 22 ;
r 4πε 0 r units of constants such as
• pressure; e.g., pV = nRT , p = ρ hg ; G = 6.67 × 10−11 N m 2 kg −2 ,
• radioactivity; e.g., N = N 0 e− λt ; ε 0 = 8.85 × 10−12 F m −1 and h = 6.63 × 10−34 J s .
and many others.

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 117

 Metric and Imperial Measurements

Length Volume Mass

÷10 ÷100 ÷1000 ÷1000 ÷1000 ÷1000 ÷1000 ÷1000

mm cm m km cm3 = ml litre m3 mg g kg tonne

METRIC
×10 ×100 ×1000 ×1000 ×1000 ×1000 ×1000 ×1000
METRIC

÷2.5 ÷1.6 ÷1.7 ÷4.5 ÷28 ÷2.2

cm inch km mile pint litre gallon g oz lb kg

×2.5 ×1.6 ×1.7 ×4.5 ×28 ×2.2

CONVERSION
CONVERSION

÷12 ÷3 ÷1760 ÷20 ÷8 ÷16 ÷14 ÷160

inch foot yard mile floz pint gallon oz lb stone ton

×12 ×3 ×1760 ×20 ×8 ×16 ×14 ×160

IMPERIAL
IMPERIAL
2.16 Compound Measures and
Rates of Change
• To use time in calculations (e.g., working out speed) pupils need to convert hours and minutes either
to decimal hours or to minutes (see the first task below).
• Don’t assume all pupils will be confident reading an analogue clock.
• See section 1.25 for further ideas.

2.16.1 Decimal Time. Answer: Do I mean 3 hours and 25 minutes or

If I went on a journey and said it took me 3.25 do I mean 3 14 hours?
hours, why might that be confusing?
3.25 h = 3h15min
How long do I really mean?

How long is 3.7 hours literally? Less than 3h45min (3.75 h, 3 34 h).
More than 3h30min (3.5 h, 3 12 h).
Could say that 0.1 h = 6 min, so 0.7 h = 42 min,
Decimal time × 60 = time in minutes.
so the time is 3h42min.

2.16.2 NEED local train/bus timetables (companies You may need to explain how the timetables
will sometimes give you as many as you want work; i.e., different sides for different
at no cost, especially if they’re nearly out of directions; “slow” and “fast” trains; different
date). services Saturday/Sunday, etc.

Oral and mental work based on times.

e.g., “I want to get to London by 6 pm. Which Pupils need to apply commonsense bearing in
train should I catch and how long will the mind that services may be delayed or
journey take?” cancelled.

2.16.3 What does it mean if an aeroplane travels at Answer:

“mach 2.5”? The “mach” number (named after Ernst Mach,
1838-1916) is the number of times the speed of
sound that the aeroplane is travelling.
Mach >1 means “supersonic”.

The speed of sound in air is 330 m/s = 760 mph (You have to say the speed of sound in air
at sea level, but it drops considerably with because sound waves need something to go
altitude (e.g., it’s only 590 mph at 30 000 ft) through – the speed of sound in a vacuum is
because of the decrease in density. zero.)

2.16.4 Do you think there’s a limit to how fast any Answer:

object can go? According to Einstein’s (1879-1955) relativity
theory, no object can go faster than the speed
Of course ordinary objects (e.g., an aeroplane) of light in a vacuum (c).
would fall to bits if we tried to make them go c = 3 × 108 m/s or 186 000 miles/s.
too fast, but Einstein’s theory is more Sometimes other speeds are given relative to c;
fundamental than that. e.g., speed of electrons in a particle accelerator
could be 0.9c.

2.16.5 When is speed measured in knots? Answer:

It’s a unit of speed often used for aircraft and
boats; 1 knot = 1 nautical mile per hour
= 1.15 land miles per hour.

2.16.6 “Around the World in 80 Days”, Jules Verne. 4 × 104

What was Phileas Fogg’s average speed? Answer: = 21 kph (approx).
80 × 24

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 2.16.7 Would you say we’re moving at the moment? Answer:
The earth is rotating. Estimate how fast you On the equator, we move 2π r metres every 24
think we’re moving (mph). hours, which is 2π × 6.4 × 106 = 4 × 107 m,
What would you need to know to work out our corresponding to a speed of about 1700 kph or
speed? 1000 mph. Off the equator it’s slower.
Radius of earth = 6.4 × 106 m
(Hint: Imagine we’re on the equator.) The angular speed is very low (0.25° per min),
so we don’t notice our direction changing. We
Why doesn’t it feel like it? can’t tell the high speed because the
atmosphere, etc. moves with us (like being on a
Of course, the earth is also orbiting the sun. very smooth train at night).

2.16.8 It takes 8 hours to fly from London to New Answers:

York, a distance of 3 500 miles. What is the
average aeroplane speed? 440 mph (sub-sonic)
Concorde gets there in about 3 12 hours. What
1000 mph (supersonic; Concorde cruises at
is Concorde’s average speed?
about Mach 2)
If Concorde could fly non-stop around the
world, how long would it take? 4 × 104 ÷ 1.6
= 25 hours (just over a day).
1000

2.16.9 I am standing on the platform at a railway Answer: If x is the (unknown) length of the
station. An inter-city train speeds through the trains, then the speed of the first train is 4x and
station and it takes 4 seconds to pass me. A
x
few moments later, another train of the same the speed of the second is 5
. Their speed
length comes through going the other way. relative to each other will therefore be
This second train takes 5 seconds to pass me. x
+ 5x = 920x . When they pass each other there is a
How long did it take them to pass each other? 4
relative distance of 2x to cover, so the time
taken will be 2 x ÷ 920x = 40
9
= 4 94 seconds.

2.16.10 Alison and Beckie run a 100 m race. Alison Answer: Alison again. When Alison runs her first
wins by exactly 1 m. If they run again, but this 100 m, Beckie will have got to 99 m, so they’ll
time Alison starts 1 m behind the starting line, be level. But then in the next 1 m Alison will
who will win this time? overtake and win by 1 cm.
Assume that they both run at steady speeds
and perform just as well on the second race.

2.16.11 If sound travels at 330 m/s, make up an easy to Answer: The speed is roughly 1 km every 3
remember rule (or check one you already seconds, so one possibility would be “count the
know) to work out how far away lightning is seconds from the flash to the thunder – could
when you see the flash and hear the thunder. say ‘zero’ on the flash – and divide by 3 to find
out the distance away in km”.

2.16.12 Density. Which weighs more, 1 kg of wood or Answer: the same, of course!
1 kg of steel? The steel would take up much less space
What is different about 1 kg of wood and 1 kg (volume) than the wood would.
of steel?
Volume = 18 × 9 × 4.5 = 729 cm3.
Work out the mass of a cuboid gold bar that is So mass = 729 × 19.32 = 14 kg (or about 30 lb).
18 cm by 9 cm by 4.5 cm.
The density of gold is 19.32 g/cm3. Yes. About 14 bags of sugar, or half a sack of
Do you think you could lift one? potatoes!
Could work out how much it would be worth. This would give a value of about £100 000.
Prices of gold vary minute by minute, but
they’re in the region of £7 000 per kg.
You could work it out as above, or scale down.
What would be the value of a silver bar the
10.49 100
same size? (The density of silver is cost = 100000 × × = £ 800 approx.
10.49 g/cm3; the cost is roughly £100 per kg.)) 19.32 7000

120 Instant Maths Ideas: 2

 2.16.13 How dense are we?! This is “average” human density in two senses.
Average human volume is about 70 litres (see Not all human beings are identical, of course,
section 2.10.14) and average human mass is but also the body is non-uniform. Bones are
around 70 kg, so average human density is dense and sink, whereas lungs are relatively
about 1 kg/litre or 1 g/cm3. This is the density light. So this is average density over the whole
of water, and that explains why we float, but body as well as the whole population.
only just.

Speed Measured in Different Units

mph
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 55 60 65 70 75 80 85 90 95

kph
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110 120 130 140 150

m/s
0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26 28 30 32 34 36 38 40 42

5
÷1.15 ×1.6 × 18

knot mph kph m/s

×1.15 ÷1.6 ÷ 185

The triangle on the left gives the formulas for speed s , distance d and time t .
The one on the right gives the formulas for density d , mass m and volume V .

d m
s t d V

Densities of Common Materials

density mass mass volume volume
material
(g/cm3) of 50 cm3 of 35 cm3 of 50 g of 35 g
water 1.00 50.0 35.0 50.00 35.00
aluminium 2.70 135.0 94.5 18.52 12.96
zinc 7.13 356.5 249.6 7.01 4.91
iron 7.87 393.5 275.5 6.35 4.45
copper 8.96 448.0 313.6 5.58 3.91
silver 10.49 524.5 367.2 4.77 3.34
lead 11.36 568.0 397.6 4.40 3.08
mercury 13.55 677.5 474.3 3.69 2.58
gold 19.32 966.0 676.2 2.59 1.81

Instant Maths Ideas: 2 121

 Key Stage 3 Strategy – Key Objectives Index
These are the key objectives from the Key Stage 3 Strategy (DfES, 2001) with references to sections of
relevant material from all three volumes.

Year 7
Simplify fractions by cancelling all common factors; identify equivalent fractions. 1.6
Recognise the equivalence of percentages, fractions and decimals. 1.11
Extend mental methods of calculation to include decimals, fractions and percentages. 1.2-11, 3.6
Multiply and divide three-digit by two-digit integers; extend to multiplying and dividing 1.5, 3.6
decimals with one or two places by single-digit integers.
Break a complex calculation into simpler steps, choosing and using appropriate and various
efficient operations and methods.
Check a result by considering whether it is of the right order of magnitude. 1.15, 2.15-16
Use letter symbols to represent unknown numbers or variables. 1.19-22, 1.26
Know and use the order of operations and understand that algebraic operations follow the 1.12, 1.20
same conventions and order as arithmetic operations.
Plot the graphs of simple linear functions. 1.23
Identify parallel and perpendicular lines; know the sum of angles at a point, on a straight 2.4-5
line and in a triangle.
Convert one metric unit to another (e.g., grams to kilograms); read and interpret scales 2.15, 1.2
on a range of measuring instruments.
Compare two simple distributions using the range and one of the mode, median or mean. 3.3
Understand and use the probability scale from 0 to 1; find and justify probabilities based 3.5
on equally likely outcomes in simple contexts.
Solve word problems and investigate in a range of contexts, explaining and justifying various
methods and conclusions.

Year 8
Add, subtract, multiply and divide integers. 1.3, 3.6
Use the equivalence of fractions, decimals and percentages to compare proportions; 1.9-11
calculate percentages and find the outcome of a given percentage increase or decrease.
Divide a quantity into two or more parts in a given ratio; use the unitary method to solve 1.10
simple word problems involving ratio and direct proportion.
Use standard column procedures for multiplication and division of integers and decimals, 1.2-3, 1.5,
including by decimals such as 0.6 or 0.06; understand where to position the decimal point 3.6
by considering equivalent calculations.
Simplify or transform linear expressions by collecting like terms; multiply a single term 1.20
over a bracket.
Substitute integers into simple formulas. 1.20
Plot the graphs of linear functions, where y is given explicitly in terms of x ; recognise 1.23
that equations of the form y = mx + c correspond to straight-line graphs.
Identify alternate and corresponding angles; understand a proof that the sum of the 2.4
angles of a triangle is 180˚ and of a quadrilateral is 360˚.
Enlarge 2-d shapes, given a centre of enlargement and a positive whole-number scale 2.12-13
factor.
Use straight edge and compasses to do standard constructions. 2.8
Deduce and use formulas for the area of a triangle and parallelogram, and the volume of a 2.2, 2.9-10
cuboid; calculate volumes and surface areas of cuboids.
Construct, on paper and using ICT, a range of graphs and charts; identify which are most 1.23-25, 3.2,
useful in the context of a problem. 3.7
Find and record all possible mutually exclusive outcomes for single events and two 1.5
successive events in a systematic way.
Identify the necessary information to solve a problem; represent problems and interpret various
solutions in algebraic, geometric or graphical form.
Use logical argument to establish the truth of a statement. various
122 Instant Maths Ideas: 2
Year 9
Add, subtract, multiply and divide fractions. 1.7-8
Use proportional reasoning to solve a problem, choosing the correct numbers to take as 1.9-10
100% or as a whole.
Make and justify estimates and approximations of calculations. 1.4, 2.15-16
Construct and solve linear equations with integer co-efficients, using an appropriate 1.18, 1.20
method.
Generate terms of a sequence using term-to-term and position-to-term definitions of the 1.19, 3.7
sequence, on paper and using ICT; write an expression to describe the n th term of an
arithmetic sequence.
Given values for m and c , find the gradient of lines given by equations of the form 1.23
y = mx + c .
Construct functions arising from real-life problems and plot their corresponding graphs; 1.24-25, 3.2
interpret graphs arising from real situations.
Solve geometrical problems using properties of angles, of parallel and intersecting lines, 2.1, 2.4-5
and of triangles and other polygons.
Know that translations, rotations and reflections preserve length and angle and map 2.12-13
objects onto congruent images.
Know and use the formulas for the circumference and area of a circle. 2.3
Design a survey or experiment to capture the necessary data from one or more sources; 3.1
determine the sample size and degree of accuracy needed; design, trial and if necessary
refine data collection sheets.
Communicate interpretations and results of a statistical enquiry using selected tables, 3.2-3
graphs and diagrams in support.
Know that the sum of probabilities of all mutually exclusive outcomes is 1 and use this 3.5
when solving problems.
Solve substantial problems by breaking them into simpler tasks, using a range of efficient 1.4, 3.7,
techniques, methods and resources, including ICT; give solutions to an appropriate various
degree of accuracy.
Present a concise, reasoned argument, using symbols, diagrams, graphs and related various
explanatory text.

Year 9 (extension)
Know and use the index laws for multiplication and division of positive integer powers. 1.14
Understand and use proportionality and calculate the result of any proportional change 1.9-10
using multiplicative methods.
Square a linear expression and expand the product of two linear expressions of the form 1.20-21
x ± n ; establish identities.
Solve a pair of simultaneous linear equations by eliminating one variable; link a graphical 1.22
representation of an equation or a pair of equations to the algebraic solution.
Change the subject of a formula. 1.20
Know that if two 2-d shapes are similar, corresponding angles are equal and 2.12
corresponding sides are in the same ratio.
Understand and apply Pythagoras’ theorem. 2.7
Know from experience of constructing them that triangles given SSS, SAS, ASA or RHS are 2.12
unique, but that triangles given SSA or AAA are not; apply these conditions to establish
the congruence of triangles.
Use measures of speed and other compound measures to solve problems. 2.16
Identify possible sources of bias in a statistical enquiry and plan how to minimise it. 3.1
Examine critically the results of a statistical enquiry and justify choice of statistical 3.1-3
representation in written presentations.
Generate fuller solutions to mathematical problems. various
Recognise limitations on the accuracy of data and measurements. 1.4

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