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Can you rank these sets of quantities in order, from smallest to largest? Can you provide convincing evidence for your rankings?
My measurements have got all jumbled up! Swap them around and see if you can find a combination where every measurement is valid.
Two engines, at opposite ends of a single track railway line, set off towards one another just as a fly, sitting on the front of one of the engines, sets off flying along the railway line...
A bus route has a total duration of 40 minutes. Every 10 minutes, two buses set out, one from each end. How many buses will one bus meet on its way from one end to the other end?
A train leaves on time. After it has gone 8 miles (at 33mph) the driver looks at his watch and sees that the hour hand is exactly over the minute hand. When did the train leave the station?
A messenger runs from the rear to the head of a marching column and back. When he gets back, the rear is where the head was when he set off. What is the ratio of his speed to that of the column?
If it takes four men one day to build a wall, how long does it take 60,000 men to build a similar wall?
This article for teachers suggests ideas for activities built around 10 and 2010.
Noticing the regular movement of the Sun and the stars has led to a desire to measure time. This article for teachers and learners looks at the history of humanity's need to measure things.
I found these clocks in the Arts Centre at the University of Warwick intriguing - do they really need four clocks and what times would be ambiguous with only two or three of them?
Galileo, a famous inventor who lived about 400 years ago, came up with an idea similar to this for making a time measuring instrument. Can you turn your pendulum into an accurate minute timer?
This article explains how Greenwich Mean Time was established and in fact, why Greenwich in London was chosen as the standard.
Use the clocks to investigate French decimal time in this problem. Can you see how this time system worked?
Calendars were one of the earliest calculating devices developed by civilizations. Find out about the Mayan calendar in this article.
Read this article to find out the mathematical method for working out what day of the week each particular date fell on back as far as 1700.
Mathematics has allowed us now to measure lots of things about eclipses and so calculate exactly when they will happen, where they can be seen from, and what they will look like.
A paradox is a statement that seems to be both untrue and true at the same time. This article looks at a few examples and challenges you to investigate them for yourself.
Mike and Monisha meet at the race track, which is 400m round. Just to make a point, Mike runs anticlockwise whilst Monisha runs clockwise. Where will they meet on their way around and will they ever meet at the start again? If so, after how many circuits?
N people visit their friends staying N kilometres along the coast. Some walk along the cliff path at N km an hour, the rest go by car. How long is the road?
Anne completes a circuit around a circular track in 40 seconds. Brenda runs in the opposite direction and meets Anne every 15 seconds. How long does it take Brenda to run around the track?
A car is travelling along a dual carriageway at constant speed. Every 3 minutes a bus passes going in the opposite direction, while every 6 minutes a bus passes the car travelling in the same direction. Buses leave the depot at regular intervals; they travel along the dual carriageway and back to the depot at a constant speed. At what interval do the buses leave the depot?
How far have these students walked by the time the teacher's car reaches them after their bus broke down?
Fifteen students had to travel 60 miles. They could use a car, which could only carry 5 students. As the car left with the first 5 (at 40 miles per hour), the remaining 10 commenced hiking along the road (at 4 miles per hour)...
My train left London between 6 a.m. and 7 a.m. and arrived in Paris between 9 a.m. and 10 a.m. At the start and end of the journey the hands on my watch were in exactly the same positions but the minute hand and hour hand had swopped places. What time did the train leave London and how long did the journey take?
Can you explain why every year must contain at least one Friday the thirteenth?
On a clock the three hands - the second, minute and hour hands - are on the same axis. How often in a 24 hour day will the second hand be parallel to either of the two other hands?
Every day at noon a boat leaves Le Havre for New York while another boat leaves New York for Le Havre. The ocean crossing takes seven days. How many boats will each boat cross during their journey?
Which segment on a digital clock is lit most each day? Which segment is lit least? Does it make any difference if it is set to 12 hours or 24 hours?
Consider a watch face which has identical hands and identical marks for the hours. It is opposite to a mirror. When is the time as read direct and in the mirror exactly the same between 6 and 7?
Two trains set off at the same time from each end of a single straight railway line. A very fast bee starts off in front of the first train and flies continuously back and forth between the two trains. How far does Sidney fly before he is squashed between the two trains?