Topics: Starter | Arithmetic

• Kath Harding, Bottisham Village College
• Tuesday, January 02, 2007
• "I like the idea behind this. I have used the same idea from mathsnet. I like the fact that this automatically records the answers BUT I do not like the way it accepts chains such as
  
  3x3=9-2=7-2
  
  for the number 5 as it encourages the inappropriate use of the = sign to give incorrect statements, a common error by students."
• I. Fulat, Mellow Lane School, Hayes
• Wednesday, January 07, 2009
• "I agree with the above comment about the chains, so I told the students they were only allowed to press = once at the end of their calculation."
• Carla Libanati, London
• Thursday, January 06, 2011
• "This is an excellent way to make pupils think out of the box!"
• Olivia Wood, Mr H Maths KA`S College
• Thursday, January 06, 2011
• "We found the questions ok but we wanted a plus sign -(+) instead of divide but I guess that would be too easy...in the end we found out all the answers and found there is a lot of different ways."
• Transum,
• Sunday, April 03, 2011
• "Thanks for your feedback. A link has now been added to a similar activity using a BIDMAS calculator."

 

• Mr. Poate, Whitecross
• Thursday, January 05, 2012
• "Simple and easy, could do with more of a challenge. Top set year 9."
• Dave, BSK Kuwait
• Monday, January 09, 2012
• "Hi. A very good activity - students become quite engaged with the puzzle. There seems to be a bit of a bug that prevents some work with negatives, however. For example: 2x2--3 should equal 7, but the calculator gives an answer of -3? Also 2x-3 gives an answer of 1? Having that bug fixed would be helpful. Thanks for all these great starters you come up with :)."
• Mrs Lingham's Year 8's, Harpenden
• Tuesday, January 10, 2012
• "We enjoyed this starter but would like a plus sign please!!!!!"

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This starter has scored a mean of 4.3 out of 5 based on 140 votes.

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