Secret Symbol

4

5

Place a symbol between the four and the five to get a number greater than four and less than five.

Decimal Point

A Mathematics Lesson Starter Of The Day


Topics: Starter | Creativity | Multiple Intelligences | Puzzles | Riddles

  • Transum,
  •  
  • This starter is new this year. It has not yet been tested with a class of 'live' pupils so not really sure whether it is just too easy or whether it will have the desired effect of stimulating the pupils to come up with and test a number of different mathematical symbols between the four and the five. Please share your experiences of using this starter with 'live' pupils if you have time. Thanks.
  • Doug, NORWICH UK
  •  
  • Good but very easy for some more able children. Some finished straight away.
  • Transum,
  • Wednesday, August 13, 2025
  • So if you suspect that this will be too easy for your students, don't show them this page. Instead show them the puzzle that was in the Newsletter called A Really Mean Number. That puzzle has a number of solutions so will keep them puzzling for longer!

    Four

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.
Click here to enter your comments.

Previous Day | This starter is for 25 April | Next Day

 

Answers

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Online Maths Shop

Laptops In Lessons

Teacher, do your students have access to computers?
Do they have iPads or Laptops in Lessons?

Whether your students each have a TabletPC, a Surface or a Mac, this activity lends itself to eLearning (Engaged Learning).

Laptops In Lessons

Here a concise URL for a version of this page without the comments.

Transum.org/go/?Start=April25

Here is the URL which will take them to a different type of mathematical puzzle.

Transum.org/go/?to=thrice

Student Activity

 



 

Curriculum Reference

See the National Curriculum page for links to related online activities and resources.

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