If you have only 40 metres of fencing available, what is the maximum area of land you can fence off?
How many different symmetrical shapes can you make by shading triangles or squares?
Players take it in turns to choose a dot on the grid. The winner is the first to have four dots that can be joined to form a square.
Imagine you have an unlimited number of four types of triangle. How many different tetrahedra can you make?
Hover your mouse over the counters to see which ones will be removed. Click to remove them. The winner is the last one to remove a counter. How you can make sure you win?
Which of these dice are right-handed and which are left-handed?
How will you go about finding all the jigsaw pieces that have one peg and one hole?
Here are some arrangements of circles. How many circles would I need to make the next size up for each? Can you create your own arrangement and investigate the number of circles it needs?
Seeing Squares game for an adult and child. Can you come up with a way of always winning this game?
An irregular tetrahedron is composed of four different triangles. Can such a tetrahedron be constructed where the side lengths are 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 units of length?
Design an arrangement of display boards in the school hall which fits the requirements of different people.
Can you work out how many cubes were used to make this open box? What size of open box could you make if you had 112 cubes?
What is the best way to shunt these carriages so that each train can continue its journey?
Can you shunt the trucks so that the Cattle truck and the Sheep truck change places and the Engine is back on the main line?
Can you recreate these designs? What are the basic units? What movement is required between each unit? Some elegant use of procedures will help - variables not essential.
Can you find a cuboid that has a surface area of exactly 100 square units. Is there more than one? Can you find them all?
An extension of noughts and crosses in which the grid is enlarged and the length of the winning line can to altered to 3, 4 or 5.
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?
10 space travellers are waiting to board their spaceships. There are two rows of seats in the waiting room. Using the rules, where are they all sitting? Can you find all the possible ways?
A game for 1 or 2 people. Use the interactive version, or play with friends. Try to round up as many counters as possible.
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outlines of the convex shapes?
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outline of this teacup?
This task, written for the National Young Mathematicians' Award 2016, involves open-topped boxes made with interlocking cubes. Explore the number of units of paint that are needed to cover the boxes. . . .
When dice land edge-up, we usually roll again. But what if we didn't...?
This article looks at levels of geometric thinking and the types of activities required to develop this thinking.
Some puzzles requiring no knowledge of knot theory, just a careful inspection of the patterns. A glimpse of the classification of knots and a little about prime knots, crossing numbers and. . . .
What is the greatest number of squares you can make by overlapping three squares?
A game for 2 players. Given a board of dots in a grid pattern, players take turns drawing a line by connecting 2 adjacent dots. Your goal is to complete more squares than your opponent.
Is it possible to rearrange the numbers 1,2......12 around a clock face in such a way that every two numbers in adjacent positions differ by any of 3, 4 or 5 hours?
These are pictures of the sea defences at New Brighton. Can you work out what a basic shape might be in both images of the sea wall and work out a way they might fit together?
In how many ways can you fit two of these yellow triangles together? Can you predict the number of ways two blue triangles can be fitted together?
A standard die has the numbers 1, 2 and 3 are opposite 6, 5 and 4 respectively so that opposite faces add to 7? If you make standard dice by writing 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 on blank cubes you will find. . . .
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outline of Mah Ling?
Players take it in turns to choose a dot on the grid. The winner is the first to have four dots that can be joined to form a square.
In each of the pictures the invitation is for you to: Count what you see. Identify how you think the pattern would continue.
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.
This 100 square jigsaw is written in code. It starts with 1 and ends with 100. Can you build it up?
Rectangles are considered different if they vary in size or have different locations. How many different rectangles can be drawn on a chessboard?
How many different triangles can you make on a circular pegboard that has nine pegs?
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outlines of the lobster, yacht and cyclist?
This article for teachers describes a project which explores the power of storytelling to convey concepts and ideas to children.
Draw some isosceles triangles with an area of $9$cm$^2$ and a vertex at (20,20). If all the vertices must have whole number coordinates, how many is it possible to draw?
Slide the pieces to move Khun Phaen past all the guards into the position on the right from which he can escape to freedom.
Take a rectangle of paper and fold it in half, and half again, to make four smaller rectangles. How many different ways can you fold it up?
Can you find a way of counting the spheres in these arrangements?
This article for teachers discusses examples of problems in which there is no obvious method but in which children can be encouraged to think deeply about the context and extend their ability to. . . .
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outlines of the people?
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outline of the house?
Can you fit the tangram pieces into the outline of the butterfly?