Filter by: Content type: ALL Problems Articles Games Stage: All Stage 1&2 Stage 2&3 Stage 3&4 Stage 4&5 Challenge level:
Can you each work out the number on your card? What do you notice? How could you sort the cards?
If you have ten counters numbered 1 to 10, how many can you put into pairs that add to 10? Which ones do you have to leave out? Why?
Skippy and Anna are locked in a room in a large castle. The key to that room, and all the other rooms, is a number. The numbers are locked away in a problem. Can you help them to get out?
I was looking at the number plate of a car parked outside. Using my special code S208VBJ adds to 65. Can you crack my code and use it to find out what both of these number plates add up to?
Bernard Bagnall recommends some primary school problems which use numbers from the environment around us, from clocks to house numbers.
There are 78 prisoners in a square cell block of twelve cells. The clever prison warder arranged them so there were 25 along each wall of the prison block. How did he do it?
Can you design a new shape for the twenty-eight squares and arrange the numbers in a logical way? What patterns do you notice?
Place the numbers 1 to 10 in the circles so that each number is the difference between the two numbers just below it.
Place the numbers 1 to 6 in the circles so that each number is the difference between the two numbers just below it.
Start by putting one million (1 000 000) into the display of your calculator. Can you reduce this to 7 using just the 7 key and add, subtract, multiply, divide and equals as many times as you like?
Ahmed is making rods using different numbers of cubes. Which rod is twice the length of his first rod?
Place six toy ladybirds into the box so that there are two ladybirds in every column and every row.
Make your own double-sided magic square. But can you complete both sides once you've made the pieces?
Investigate what happens when you add house numbers along a street in different ways.
Can you make a cycle of pairs that add to make a square number using all the numbers in the box below, once and once only?
In a square in which the houses are evenly spaced, numbers 3 and 10 are opposite each other. What is the smallest and what is the largest possible number of houses in the square?
Use these head, body and leg pieces to make Robot Monsters which are different heights.
In how many ways could Mrs Beeswax put ten coins into her three puddings so that each pudding ended up with at least two coins?
Use the information about Sally and her brother to find out how many children there are in the Brown family.
How could you put eight beanbags in the hoops so that there are four in the blue hoop, five in the red and six in the yellow? Can you find all the ways of doing this?
There are 44 people coming to a dinner party. There are 15 square tables that seat 4 people. Find a way to seat the 44 people using all 15 tables, with no empty places.
You have 5 darts and your target score is 44. How many different ways could you score 44?
Find all the numbers that can be made by adding the dots on two dice.
This magic square has operations written in it, to make it into a maze. Start wherever you like, go through every cell and go out a total of 15!
Move from the START to the FINISH by moving across or down to the next square. Can you find a route to make these totals?
Can you put plus signs in so this is true? 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 = 99 How many ways can you do it?
Zumf makes spectacles for the residents of the planet Zargon, who have either 3 eyes or 4 eyes. How many lenses will Zumf need to make all the different orders for 9 families?
Arrange eight of the numbers between 1 and 9 in the Polo Square below so that each side adds to the same total.
Find your way through the grid starting at 2 and following these operations. What number do you end on?
Choose four of the numbers from 1 to 9 to put in the squares so that the differences between joined squares are odd.
Can you see why 2 by 2 could be 5? Can you predict what 2 by 10 will be?
These caterpillars have 16 parts. What different shapes do they make if each part lies in the small squares of a 4 by 4 square?
There are 4 jugs which hold 9 litres, 7 litres, 4 litres and 2 litres. Find a way to pour 9 litres of drink from one jug to another until you are left with exactly 3 litres in three of the jugs.
If the answer's 2010, what could the question be?
Well now, what would happen if we lost all the nines in our number system? Have a go at writing the numbers out in this way and have a look at the multiplications table.
Can you hang weights in the right place to make the equaliser balance?
Using the statements, can you work out how many of each type of rabbit there are in these pens?
48 is called an abundant number because it is less than the sum of its factors (without itself). Can you find some more abundant numbers?
We start with one yellow cube and build around it to make a 3x3x3 cube with red cubes. Then we build around that red cube with blue cubes and so on. How many cubes of each colour have we used?
Choose a symbol to put into the number sentence.
Can you arrange 5 different digits (from 0 - 9) in the cross in the way described?
Using the cards 2, 4, 6, 8, +, - and =, what number statements can you make?
In this section from a calendar, put a square box around the 1st, 2nd, 8th and 9th. Add all the pairs of numbers. What do you notice about the answers?
Make one big triangle so the numbers that touch on the small triangles add to 10. You could use the interactivity to help you.
Cherri, Saxon, Mel and Paul are friends. They are all different ages. Can you find out the age of each friend using the information?
Explore Alex's number plumber. What questions would you like to ask? What do you think is happening to the numbers?
Starting with the number 180, take away 9 again and again, joining up the dots as you go. Watch out - don't join all the dots!
Can you use the information to find out which cards I have used?
This big box adds something to any number that goes into it. If you know the numbers that come out, what addition might be going on in the box?
Investigate this balance which is marked in halves. If you had a weight on the left-hand 7, where could you hang two weights on the right to make it balance?