Halloween

A pumpkin weighed 6½ kg before it was carved. It now weighs 1½ kg. What fraction of its weight has been removed?
Pumpkin

How many ghosts are in the haunted house?
Here are some clues:
There are more than the number of days in October
There are less than the product of 7 and 5
The answer is an odd number
Ghost

Seven mummies in a row
Fifteen rows plus another two
I think it's time that you should go
Because all those mummies are after you
Mummy Mummy Mummy Mummy Mummy Mummy Mummy
How many mummies are chasing you?

Bat Moon
How many bats?
Clue: A square number;
More than four squared;
Less than four cubed;
Even.

Grim Reaper Count your toes and hands and feet
Multiply those three sums
Add the month when ghosts all meet
Subtract the date halloween comes.

Starter of The Day Transum Mathematics Topics

Topics: Starter | Fractions | Mixed

Transum,
Here's a joke for the teacher:

Why do mathematicians think that Halloween is the same as Christmas?

Answer: 31 Oct = 25 Dec

[Think number bases!]
S. Hale, Woodchurch HS
Classes really enjoyed this starter, I split the class into groups and had a quiz of the five questions. It revised a lot of different maths the only criticism is that you have six mummies in a row and not seven as said in the question.

[Transum: The lost mummy has been found. Thanks for pointing it out]
Tom Howe, Barnwell Secondary School
A very good idea for a website because it promotes fun in maths.
E.Maginn, Bebington High
A fun starter that all my groups enjoyed!(Years 7,8+9)Pity there were only six mummies.
Karen, Mlps Albany Australia
My class and I would have liked to have had scary music accompanying the opening / clicking on windows - i.e. as it zooms in.

[Transum:Thanks for the suggestion Karen. A clap of thunder and a little music now accompanies the opening of the windows. Best experienced with your speakers turned up high!]
Mrs Cranbury, Five Dock High
Awesome.

How did you use this starter? Can you suggest how teachers could present or develop this resource? Do you have any comments? It is always useful to receive feedback and helps make this free resource even more useful for Maths teachers anywhere in the world.
Click here to enter your comments.

If you don't have the time to provide feedback we'd really appreciate it if you could give this page a score! We are constantly improving and adding to these starters so it would be really helpful to know which ones are most useful. Simply click on a button below:

Excellent, I would like to see more like this
Good, achieved the results I required
Satisfactory
Didn't really capture the interest of the students
Not for me! I wouldn't use this type of activity.

This starter has scored a mean of 3.3 out of 5 based on 562 votes.

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Answers

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Apple iPad Pro

The analytics show that more and more people are accessing Transum Mathematics via an iPad as it is so portable and responsive. The iPad has so many other uses in addition to solving Transum's puzzles and challenges and it would make an excellent gift for anyone.

The redesigned Retina display is as stunning to look at as it is to touch. It all comes with iOS, the world's most advanced mobile operating system. iPad Pro. Everything you want modern computing to be. more...

Before giving an iPad as a Christmas gift you could add a link to iPad Maths to the home screen.

Math with Bad Drawings

I had been tutoring the wonderful Betsy for five years. When the day came for our last ever session together before the end of her Year 13, I received this beautiful book as a gift of appreciation.

This a very readable book by Ben Orlin. I'm really enjoying the humour in the writing and the drawings are great.

Ben Orlin answers maths' three big questions: Why do I need to learn this? When am I ever going to use it? Why is it so hard? The answers come in various forms-cartoons, drawings, jokes, and the stories and insights of an empathetic teacher who believes that mathematics should belong to everyone.


	Teacher, do your students have access to computers? Do they have iPads or Laptops in Lessons? Whether your students each have a TabletPC, a Surface or a Mac, this activity lends itself to eLearning (Engaged Learning).

Here a concise URL for a version of this page without the comments.

Transum.org/go/?Start=October31

Here is the URL which will take them to a related student activity called 'Trick or Treat'.

Transum.org/go/?to=Treat

But if it is something less mathematical with a Halloween theme you want:

Transum.org/go/?to=hsquorder

Creative Commons Spooky sound effect (Ambient Darkness) is by D J Chronos at Freesound.org