Resources tagged with: Properties of numbers

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Broad Topics > Numbers and the Number System > Properties of numbers

28 and It's Upward and Onward

Age 7 to 11 Challenge Level:

Can you find ways of joining cubes together so that 28 faces are visible?

Got it Article

Age 7 to 14

This article gives you a few ideas for understanding the Got It! game and how you might find a winning strategy.

Which Numbers? (1)

Age 7 to 11 Challenge Level:

I am thinking of three sets of numbers less than 101. They are the red set, the green set and the blue set. Can you find all the numbers in the sets from these clues?

Numbers Numbers Everywhere!

Age 5 to 11

Bernard Bagnall recommends some primary school problems which use numbers from the environment around us, from clocks to house numbers.

Sort Them Out (2)

Age 7 to 11 Challenge Level:

Can you each work out the number on your card? What do you notice? How could you sort the cards?

Which Numbers? (2)

Age 7 to 11 Challenge Level:

I am thinking of three sets of numbers less than 101. Can you find all the numbers in each set from these clues?

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

If you take a three by three square on a 1-10 addition square and multiply the diagonally opposite numbers together, what is the difference between these products. Why?

Light the Lights Again

Age 7 to 11 Challenge Level:

Each light in this interactivity turns on according to a rule. What happens when you enter different numbers? Can you find the smallest number that lights up all four lights?

Unlocking the Case

Age 7 to 11 Challenge Level:

A case is found with a combination lock. There is one clue about the number needed to open the case. Can you find the number and open the case?

Take One Example

Age 5 to 11

This article introduces the idea of generic proof for younger children and illustrates how one example can offer a proof of a general result through unpacking its underlying structure.

Always, Sometimes or Never? Number

Age 7 to 11 Challenge Level:

Are these statements always true, sometimes true or never true?

Cogs

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

A and B are two interlocking cogwheels having p teeth and q teeth respectively. One tooth on B is painted red. Find the values of p and q for which the red tooth on B contacts every gap on the. . . .

Escape from the Castle

Age 7 to 11 Challenge Level:

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?

Cinema Problem

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

A cinema has 100 seats. Show how it is possible to sell exactly 100 tickets and take exactly £100 if the prices are £10 for adults, 50p for pensioners and 10p for children.

Like Powers

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Investigate $1^n + 19^n + 20^n + 51^n + 57^n + 80^n + 82^n$ and $2^n + 12^n + 31^n + 40^n + 69^n + 71^n + 85^n$ for different values of n.

Small Change

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

In how many ways can a pound (value 100 pence) be changed into some combination of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20 and 50 pence coins?

Even So

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Find some triples of whole numbers a, b and c such that a^2 + b^2 + c^2 is a multiple of 4. Is it necessarily the case that a, b and c must all be even? If so, can you explain why?

Four Coloured Lights

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Imagine a machine with four coloured lights which respond to different rules. Can you find the smallest possible number which will make all four colours light up?

Table Patterns Go Wild!

Age 7 to 11 Challenge Level:

Nearly all of us have made table patterns on hundred squares, that is 10 by 10 grids. This problem looks at the patterns on differently sized square grids.

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Visitors to Earth from the distant planet of Zub-Zorna were amazed when they found out that when the digits in this multiplication were reversed, the answer was the same! Find a way to explain. . . .

Age 7 to 14 Challenge Level:

I added together some of my neighbours' house numbers. Can you explain the patterns I noticed?

Special Numbers

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

My two digit number is special because adding the sum of its digits to the product of its digits gives me my original number. What could my number be?

Unit Fractions

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Consider the equation 1/a + 1/b + 1/c = 1 where a, b and c are natural numbers and 0 < a < b < c. Prove that there is only one set of values which satisfy this equation.

Summing Consecutive Numbers

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

15 = 7 + 8 and 10 = 1 + 2 + 3 + 4. Can you say which numbers can be expressed as the sum of two or more consecutive integers?

Chameleons

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Whenever two chameleons of different colours meet they change colour to the third colour. Describe the shortest sequence of meetings in which all the chameleons change to green if you start with 12. . . .

Mini-max

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Consider all two digit numbers (10, 11, . . . ,99). In writing down all these numbers, which digits occur least often, and which occur most often ? What about three digit numbers, four digit numbers. . . .

Magic Letters

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Charlie has made a Magic V. Can you use his example to make some more? And how about Magic Ls, Ns and Ws?

Three Neighbours

Age 7 to 11 Challenge Level:

Look at three 'next door neighbours' amongst the counting numbers. Add them together. What do you notice?

Oh! Hidden Inside?

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Find the number which has 8 divisors, such that the product of the divisors is 331776.

Power Crazy

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

What can you say about the values of n that make $7^n + 3^n$ a multiple of 10? Are there other pairs of integers between 1 and 10 which have similar properties?

Counting Factors

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Is there an efficient way to work out how many factors a large number has?

The Codabar Check

Age 11 to 14

This article explains how credit card numbers are defined and the check digit serves to verify their accuracy.

Whole Numbers Only

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Can you work out how many of each kind of pencil this student bought?

Elevenses

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

How many pairs of numbers can you find that add up to a multiple of 11? Do you notice anything interesting about your results?

The Patent Solution

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

A combination mechanism for a safe comprises thirty-two tumblers numbered from one to thirty-two in such a way that the numbers in each wheel total 132... Could you open the safe?

Lesser Digits

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

How many positive integers less than or equal to 4000 can be written down without using the digits 7, 8 or 9?

N Is a Number

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

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?

Alphabet Soup

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

This challenge is to make up YOUR OWN alphanumeric. Each letter represents a digit and where the same letter appears more than once it must represent the same digit each time.

Arrange the Digits

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Can you arrange the digits 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9 into three 3-digit numbers such that their total is close to 1500?

Writ Large

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Suppose you had to begin the never ending task of writing out the natural numbers: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.... and so on. What would be the 1000th digit you would write down.

Helen's Conjecture

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Helen made the conjecture that "every multiple of six has more factors than the two numbers either side of it". Is this conjecture true?

Magic Crosses

Age 7 to 14 Challenge Level:

Can you find examples of magic crosses? Can you find all the possibilities?

Prime Magic

Age 7 to 16 Challenge Level:

Place the numbers 1, 2, 3,..., 9 one on each square of a 3 by 3 grid so that all the rows and columns add up to a prime number. How many different solutions can you find?

Six Times Five

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

How many six digit numbers are there which DO NOT contain a 5?

Guess the Dominoes

Age 7 to 14 Challenge Level:

This task depends on learners sharing reasoning, listening to opinions, reflecting and pulling ideas together.

Satisfying Statements

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

Can you find any two-digit numbers that satisfy all of these statements?

Guess the Dominoes for Two

Age 7 to 14 Challenge Level:

Guess the Dominoes for child and adult. Work out which domino your partner has chosen by asking good questions.

Sept 03

Age 11 to 14 Challenge Level:

What is the last digit of the number 1 / 5^903 ?