List

Famous Mathematicians

Each of these articles, accessible to upper primary students, focuses on a well-known mathematician.
What did Turing do for us?
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What did Turing do for us?

Dr James Grime takes an Enigma machine in to schools. Here he describes how the code-breaking work of Turing and his contemporaries helped to win the war.

Emmy Noether
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Emmy Noether

Find out about Emmy Noether, whose ideas linked physics and algebra, and whom Einstein described as a 'creative mathematical genius'.

Pythagoras
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Pythagoras

Pythagoras of Samos was a Greek philosopher who lived from about 580 BC to about 500 BC. Find out about the important developments he made in mathematics, astronomy, and the theory of music.
Coordinates and Descartes
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Coordinates and Descartes

Have you ever wondered how maps are made? Or perhaps who first thought of the idea of designing maps? We're here to answer these questions for you.

Eureka!
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Eureka!

Read this article to find out about the discoveries and inventions of Archimedes.
Maurits Cornelius Escher
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Maurits Cornelius Escher

Have you ever noticed how mathematical ideas are often used in patterns that we see all around us? This article describes the life of Escher who was a passionate believer that maths and art can be intertwined.

All is Number
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All is number

Read all about Pythagoras' mathematical discoveries in this article written for students.

Going Places with Mathematicians
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Going places with mathematicians

This article looks at the importance in mathematics of representing places and spaces mathematics. Many famous mathematicians have spent time working on problems that involve moving and mapping things.
From One Shape to Another
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From one shape to another

Read about David Hilbert who proved that any polygon could be cut up into a certain number of pieces that could be put back together to form any other polygon of equal area.
Clever Carl
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Clever Carl

What would you do if your teacher asked you add all the numbers from 1 to 100? Find out how Carl Gauss responded when he was asked to do just that.

History of Morse
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History of Morse

This short article gives an outline of the origins of Morse code and its inventor and how the frequency of letters is reflected in the code they were given.