Search by Topic

Resources tagged with Generalising similar to Wrapping Presents:

Filter by: Content type:
Stage:
Challenge level: Challenge Level:1 Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:3

There are 127 results

Broad Topics > Using, Applying and Reasoning about Mathematics > Generalising

problem icon

Odd Squares

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

Think of a number, square it and subtract your starting number. Is the number you’re left with odd or even? How do the images help to explain this?

problem icon

Taking Steps

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

In each of the pictures the invitation is for you to: Count what you see. Identify how you think the pattern would continue.

problem icon

Dotty Circle

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

Watch this film carefully. Can you find a general rule for explaining when the dot will be this same distance from the horizontal axis?

problem icon

Counting Counters

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

Take a counter and surround it by a ring of other counters that MUST touch two others. How many are needed?

problem icon

Cuisenaire Rods

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

These squares have been made from Cuisenaire rods. Can you describe the pattern? What would the next square look like?

problem icon

Domino Numbers

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

Can you see why 2 by 2 could be 5? Can you predict what 2 by 10 will be?

problem icon

Painted Cube

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

Imagine a large cube made from small red cubes being dropped into a pot of yellow paint. How many of the small cubes will have yellow paint on their faces?

problem icon

Move a Match

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

How can you arrange these 10 matches in four piles so that when you move one match from three of the piles into the fourth, you end up with the same arrangement?

problem icon

Chess

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

What would be the smallest number of moves needed to move a Knight from a chess set from one corner to the opposite corner of a 99 by 99 square board?

problem icon

Lost Books

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

While we were sorting some papers we found 3 strange sheets which seemed to come from small books but there were page numbers at the foot of each page. Did the pages come from the same book?

problem icon

Make 37

Stage: 2 and 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

Four bags contain a large number of 1s, 3s, 5s and 7s. Pick any ten numbers from the bags above so that their total is 37.

problem icon

Christmas Chocolates

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

How could Penny, Tom and Matthew work out how many chocolates there are in different sized boxes?

problem icon

Cunning Card Trick

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

Delight your friends with this cunning trick! Can you explain how it works?

problem icon

Sticky Triangles

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

Can you continue this pattern of triangles and begin to predict how many sticks are used for each new "layer"?

problem icon

Polygonals

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

Polygonal numbers are those that are arranged in shapes as they enlarge. Explore the polygonal numbers drawn here.

problem icon

Button-up Some More

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

How many ways can you find to do up all four buttons on my coat? How about if I had five buttons? Six ...?

problem icon

Handshakes

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

Can you find an efficient method to work out how many handshakes there would be if hundreds of people met?

problem icon

Picturing Square Numbers

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

Square numbers can be represented as the sum of consecutive odd numbers. What is the sum of 1 + 3 + ..... + 149 + 151 + 153?

problem icon

Tourism

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

If you can copy a network without lifting your pen off the paper and without drawing any line twice, then it is traversable. Decide which of these diagrams are traversable.

problem icon

Number Differences

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

Place the numbers from 1 to 9 in the squares below so that the difference between joined squares is odd. How many different ways can you do this?

problem icon

Triangle Pin-down

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

Use the interactivity to investigate what kinds of triangles can be drawn on peg boards with different numbers of pegs.

problem icon

Frogs

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

How many moves does it take to swap over some red and blue frogs? Do you have a method?

problem icon

Mystic Rose

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

Use the animation to help you work out how many lines are needed to draw mystic roses of different sizes.

problem icon

Broken Toaster

Stage: 2 Short Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

Only one side of a two-slice toaster is working. What is the quickest way to toast both sides of three slices of bread?

problem icon

Cubes Within Cubes Revisited

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

Imagine starting with one yellow cube and covering it all over with a single layer of red cubes, and then covering that cube with a layer of blue cubes. How many red and blue cubes would you need?

problem icon

Picturing Triangle Numbers

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

Triangle numbers can be represented by a triangular array of squares. What do you notice about the sum of identical triangle numbers?

problem icon

Squares in Rectangles

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

A 2 by 3 rectangle contains 8 squares and a 3 by 4 rectangle contains 20 squares. What size rectangle(s) contain(s) exactly 100 squares? Can you find them all?

problem icon

Intersecting Circles

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

Three circles have a maximum of six intersections with each other. What is the maximum number of intersections that a hundred circles could have?

problem icon

The Great Tiling Count

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

Compare the numbers of particular tiles in one or all of these three designs, inspired by the floor tiles of a church in Cambridge.

problem icon

Tilted Squares

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

It's easy to work out the areas of most squares that we meet, but what if they were tilted?

problem icon

Sliding Puzzle

Stage: 1, 2, 3 and 4 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

The aim of the game is to slide the green square from the top right hand corner to the bottom left hand corner in the least number of moves.

problem icon

Who Is the Fairest of Them All?

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

Explore the effect of combining enlargements.

problem icon

Squares, Squares and More Squares

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

Can you dissect a square into: 4, 7, 10, 13... other squares? 6, 9, 12, 15... other squares? 8, 11, 14... other squares?

problem icon

2001 Spatial Oddity

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

With one cut a piece of card 16 cm by 9 cm can be made into two pieces which can be rearranged to form a square 12 cm by 12 cm. Explain how this can be done.

problem icon

Oddly

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

Find the sum of all three-digit numbers each of whose digits is odd.

problem icon

Cuboid Challenge

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

What size square corners should be cut from a square piece of paper to make a box with the largest possible volume?

problem icon

Threesomes

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

Imagine an infinitely large sheet of square dotty paper on which you can draw triangles of any size you wish (providing each vertex is on a dot). What areas is it/is it not possible to draw?

problem icon

...on the Wall

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

Explore the effect of reflecting in two intersecting mirror lines.

problem icon

Cut it Out

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

Can you dissect an equilateral triangle into 6 smaller ones? What number of smaller equilateral triangles is it NOT possible to dissect a larger equilateral triangle into?

problem icon

Fault-free Rectangles

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

Find out what a "fault-free" rectangle is and try to make some of your own.

problem icon

Shear Magic

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

What are the areas of these triangles? What do you notice? Can you generalise to other "families" of triangles?

problem icon

Games Related to Nim

Stage: 1, 2, 3 and 4

This article for teachers describes several games, found on the site, all of which have a related structure that can be used to develop the skills of strategic planning.

problem icon

Tiling

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

An investigation that gives you the opportunity to make and justify predictions.

problem icon

Searching for Mean(ing)

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

Imagine you have a large supply of 3kg and 8kg weights. How many of each weight would you need for the average (mean) of the weights to be 6kg? What other averages could you have?

problem icon

Litov's Mean Value Theorem

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

Start with two numbers. This is the start of a sequence. The next number is the average of the last two numbers. Continue the sequence. What will happen if you carry on for ever?

problem icon

How Much Can We Spend?

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:1

A country has decided to have just two different coins, 3z and 5z coins. Which totals can be made? Is there a largest total that cannot be made? How do you know?

problem icon

Magic Constants

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

In a Magic Square all the rows, columns and diagonals add to the 'Magic Constant'. How would you change the magic constant of this square?

problem icon

Is There a Theorem?

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

Draw a square. A second square of the same size slides around the first always maintaining contact and keeping the same orientation. How far does the dot travel?

problem icon

More Magic Potting Sheds

Stage: 3 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3 Challenge Level:3

The number of plants in Mr McGregor's magic potting shed increases overnight. He'd like to put the same number of plants in each of his gardens, planting one garden each day. How can he do it?

problem icon

Nim-7

Stage: 2 Challenge Level: Challenge Level:2 Challenge Level:2

Can you work out how to win this game of Nim? Does it matter if you go first or second?


The NRICH Project aims to enrich the mathematical experiences of all learners. To support this aim, members of the NRICH team work in a wide range of capacities, including providing professional development for teachers wishing to embed rich mathematical tasks into everyday classroom practice. More information on many of our other activities can be found here.
Copyright © 1997 - 2012. University of Cambridge. All rights reserved.
NRICH is part of the family of activities in the Millennium Mathematics Project.