Love Maths

Find the nine mathematical words hidden in the love story below. The last letters of the hidden words form an anagram of the name of a famous mathematician.

Is love at first sight fact or fiction? Trudi Gittins first met Lee Smith at a popular cafe. She engaged him in useless small talk but offered genuine signs that she fancied him. She told him that she liked to read Dickens and preferred sombre rather than gleeful parties. He said he bought a brand new car each year as it helped him relax. Is love in the air for Trudi and Lee?

A Mathematics Lesson Starter Of The Day


Topics: Starter | Vocabulary

  • Transum,
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  • A new starter for a new (northern hemisphere) academic year. Something quite different as a settling activity before the main part of your lesson. Something that might capture the interest of young people not expecting this kind of start to a mathematics lesson. Something to wake up the memories of the mathematical concepts the words relate to. Please let us all know if your pupils manage to do this activity without any of the words being revealed. Enjoy!
  • Pippa Tyler, Beaminster School, Dorset
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  • I set this activity with my Year 10 Set 4 and Year 11 Set 1. They both loved it. The Year 10 class found about half of the words with no help but Year 11 found all 9 and then had great fun trying to unravel the anagram with some interesting names produced!! They did succeed in finding the famous mathematician and then we spent some time finding out what he had done for Maths. A really different starter; please can we have more like this.
  • Chloe Sheppard, Newcastleton
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  • This was great if it showed the answers. Don't know whether it was just me who couldn't figure it out. 7 out of 10.

    [Transum: The answers to all of the Starters, online exercise and puzzles are available lower down the page but only appear when signed in]
  • AllontheBoard, Twitter
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How did you use this starter? Can you suggest how teachers could present or develop this resource? Do you have any comments? It is always useful to receive feedback and helps make this free resource even more useful for Maths teachers anywhere in the world.
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Answer



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Laptops In Lessons

Teacher, do your students have access to computers such as tablets, iPads or Laptops?  This page was really designed for projection on a whiteboard but if you really want the students to have access to it here is a concise URL for a version of this page without the comments:

Transum.org/go/?Start=September1

However it would be better to assign one of the student interactive activities below.

Laptops In Lessons

Here is the URL which will take them to another activity involving mathematical words.

Transum.org/go/?to=hexblock

Student Activity


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