Barney Maunder-Taylor
Barney Maunder-Taylor 
DECIMALS ARE WAAAY BETTER THAN FRACTIONS: most GCSE students prefer decimals because they allow you to compare the sizes of two numbers at a glance! For instance, which is bigger out of $\frac{2}{5}$ and $\frac{3}{7}$?
… or so thought Leopold Kronecker (1823-1891) in his famous quote. WHY KRONECKER WAS WRONG: the integers (whole numbers) include the Positive Integers or “counting numbers” 1, 2, 3, 4 and so on: easy for
In statistics, these wonderful techniques allow us to use some data that we have collected to make predictions and conclusions about the real world. AN EXAMPLE: Amy and Bill are playing snakes and ladders, but
Factorials are so cool that the notation is: AN EXCLAMATION MARK!!!! The exclamation mark means something very specific in maths. It’s great to be impressed with numbers, but please do not put an exclamation mark
INDEX (plural indices): you can see these in expressions like $5^2 = 25$. The 5 is called the BASE, the 2 is called the EXPONENT or INDEX, and the 25 is called a power (in
TRICKY TILINGS:
Tiling stores are like treasure troves of geometrical amusement. Here’s a photo I took yesterday. The puzzle is simply: what shape(s) do you see?
ANSWER: ….
TRIGONOMETRY is the branch of maths to do with sin, cos and tan (find them on your calculator). Literally it means “measuring triangles” – so you can use these three functions to find unknown lengths
CURIOUS LOGIC: on one side of a postcard are written the words “the sentence on the other side is true”. You turn over the card to see the words “the sentence on the other side is false”. Which of the two sentences, if either, is the true statement? – Head over to the Blog page to find out the answer.