Sign up for free

NSPCC Number Day

It’s maths but not as you know it!

The NSPCC have everything you need to make maths fun and support your school’s fundraising events and activities. You’ll receive your Number Day welcome pack and promotional posters in the post. You can also download this year’s resources.

Planning your Number Day is as easy as 1, 2, 3:

  • put the date in your diary – Friday 1 February 2020 (or another date that suits your school!)
  • plan your activities and fundraising – get your whole school involved! There are lots of ways you can have fun with numbers – we’ve got your favourite activities, and new activities for all ages.
  • spread the word – we’ve sent posters to your school and you can download more below. Take a look at our assembly plan, promotional posters and letter to parents for easy ways to promote your Number Day and raise money to keep children safe.

Sweetie STEM

Sweetie STEM - Children Engagement

We all know what a struggle it can be to get children to engage with a concept, particularly when we only have a pencil and paper to help us explain it. The more hands-on we can make it, the better. So…

What better way to get children’s engagement than to use sweets?

Here are a few activity ideas that you can complete with a pack of colourful sweeties. For example, Skittles or Smarties would work well. These activities help to bring learning to life, give the learning a purpose and, perhaps most importantly of all, you get to eat the sweets at the end!

Data Handling

Screenshot 2020 01 03 at 20.07.39
Screenshot 2020 01 03 at 20.07.10
Screenshot 2020 01 03 at 20.07.19

To begin, take your sweets and sort them by colour. Using a few packets together helps to create a larger sample size for your data handling. Younger children will enjoy ordering them into a simple pictograph, illustrating which colour is represented the most. Older children can instead represent this information in a bar chart. If you’re looking for a further challenge, move on to creating a pie chart, calculating the fractions and percentages of each colour. You could also compare your sweetie data with a partner, considering the following questions:

  • What do you notice about your graph?
  • Was there an even distribution of colours across the packets?
  • Which two colours have the maximum difference between them?

Shape, Space and Measure

Screenshot 2020 01 03 at 20.07.58
Screenshot 2020 01 03 at 20.07.49
Screenshot 2020 01 03 at 20.07.26

Estimating and Comparing: Before you open the packet, estimate how many sweets you think will be inside it, including how many of each colour. Then open it up and find out if your estimation was correct! It’s interesting to compare packets, exploring whether there is an even distribution of each colour. Older children could calculate the ratios of different colours.

2D Shapes: Younger children could arrange their sweets to create different 2D shapes, as shown in the photo above. They could then count how many sweets fit into each shape. Another activity could be to create symmetrical patterns with the sweeties, or even to create half a symmetrical pattern for a partner to complete. Just be careful your fingers don’t get to warm and melt the coating off the sweets!

Number patterns: This is a really fun way of exploring patterns! Begin a sequence for your child to complete, discussing what the pattern is and how they knew what colours to add next.

Symmetry

Photo 07 01 2020 15 17 26 rotated
Photo 07 01 2020 15 19 33 rotated
Photo 07 01 2020 15 23 10 rotated

This activity is really easy to resource and the results are always amazing to watch! Arrange your sweets in a symmetrical pattern around a plate, pour warm water into the middle and watch the coating on the sweets diffuse, creating a beautiful pattern in the water.

Share how you got on with these activities in the comments below and add any other sweetie related STEM activity ideas. 

Origami and STEM

origami and stem

There’s something about origami that really seems to capture children’s imagination. In almost every class across the country you’re likely to find at least one child with a real passion for origami. Many a show-and-tell has been dominated by incredible paper-folding creations, from water bombs to paper dragons. Think back to your own school days. Which of these origami classics do you remember creating?




Origami is the ancient art of Japanese paper folding. For many, a love of origami stems from childhood. As much as we might marvel at this paper art-form,

Do we see its hidden STEM potential?

Origami has evolved to be much more than paper folding. Here are some examples, along with examples of how their STEM potential is applied in the real-world.



In primary school, origami is a fantastic way to explore mathematical concepts including geometry, fractions and angles. Turning a simple square of paper into a piece of completed origami involves a lot of mathematical thinking. Origami instructions involve following steps of folds, often referred to as ‘crease patterns’, in order to create different geometric constructions. Children will need to use knowledge of directionality and angles in order to complete these correctly. Throughout the process they will create other shapes starting from a square including equilateral triangles, pentagons and hexagons. Patterns also feature heavily in origami.


Check out this video about the maths and magic of origami:




Many of the real-world applications for origami can be found within engineering. Take car airbags for example. Did you know that their compact, quick inflating design was inspired by origami? Engineers took inspiration from origami patterns and folding methods to deploy how the airbag is stored and deployed. Engineers are continuing to draw upon origami techniques when developing new structures and technologies.



In 2003, a new, origami-inspired heart stent design was created. Designed around an origami water bomb base, the purpose of the stent was to enlarge clogged arteries and veins. The origami design allows the stent to be expanded to different sizes depending on its application. Likewise, origami-inspired forceps are helping to revolutionise robotic surgery, allowing for delicate, precise cuts.


There are plenty of examples of origami-inspired space technology. One such is the solar array. The combination of different folds expands into a large, flat circular surface. These solar arrays can then be used to convert solar energy into electrical power. More examples of how NASA engineers use origami to design future spacecraft can be found here:

And all this is just the start! So next time you see a child folding their paper to make an origami creation, use it as an opportunity to share with them the hidden STEM potential and real-world applications of origami.


This post has been included in Twinkl’s End of Terms Activities blog.

The Big Blog of Maths Picture Books

maths picture books

Picture books are a fantastic way to explore mathematical concepts. We’ve selected our favourites and matched them to the following mathematical areas: place value, calculation, fractions and measurement.

Click on each image to find out more about the book including the age recommendation, key concept and an Amazon link.

 

 

NUMBER: PLACE VALUE 

NUMBER: CALCULATIONS

FRACTIONS

MEASUREMENT

GEOMETRY

OTHER

Have we missed off a brilliant book? Comment below and we’ll add it on!