Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 16/09/2026I think a thing with this, however we format it, is to make them do the same question in different ways, adjusting the transformations as they do them in different orders. Tell them to do it a specific way and a lot of kids will just end up reverting to what their instincts tell them. 120
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 31/05/2026Thank you. It does look good, leafing through it. I really remember being told to ignore the ‘guff from the government’. (Happily, ignored that and discovered the standards unit gathering dust!) 110
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 31/05/2026It has been supportive and those materials and ideas are fairly well integrated into the lessons for the support classes. I think the work group was focussed on teaching in lessons rather than separate interventions. That’s a good prompt though - I will go back and check with him. Thank you! 110
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 31/05/2026My deputy did that last year and rated it very highly 110
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 31/05/2026And do you know anything about the summer numeracy school it mentions? 100
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 31/05/2026Thank you. I did remember that from all the boxes in the office I was told to ignore when I started teaching, so I went back and read the overview. Do you use the materials outside normal maths class time? If so, do you work through the materials or do different things with different kids? 100
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 31/05/2026If you were starting from scratch with a Key Stage 3 intervention programme for children who weren’t ’secondary ready’ (for a want of a more suitable quick description) in maths, what would it be? Imagine money and resource no object. 334
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 08/04/2026Including this lovely plan for Detroit… 010
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 08/04/2026Reading a book about J Dilla. Lots of lovely mathsy diagrams. 120
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 21/03/2026New favourite bookshop libreria.iolibreria.ioLibreria | Independent Bookshop in East LondonExplore curated reads and cultural events at Libreria – a boundary-pushing independent bookshop and creative space in the heart of Shoreditch. 110
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 17/03/2026Anyone fancying a change of scene or first new job could come work with Catriona and me. Great kids, caring SLT, fun supportive department. Essex/Cambridgeshire borders, easy reach of Cambridge. Ad says KS3-5 but would be also be happy to hear from anyone who would rather not teach A-level. 022
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 13/10/2025#MathsToday Student asked a delightful question. If asked to sketch a graph in an exam, could you draw non-orthogonal axes and then do the sketch correctly according to those and still get the marks? I said you’d probably unlock a secret grade. 160
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 24/05/2025And Year 7 were doing the same thing in the classroom below, which made me smile! 040
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 02/03/2025Any of the generalisation-for-beginners-type ones. Areas of trapeziums on isometric paper comes to mind. 051
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 02/03/2025#MathToday but last week. It feels like an important thing about circles theorems that kids draw them while thinking about the structure. Interesting to see how different classes react when asked to work with their 'mind's eye'. 282
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 24/01/2025And obviously there were waffles and ice cream for breakfast. 120
Reposted by Jonathan DunningJonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 16/01/2025New opening in my lovely department. Wonderful colleagues, very supportive SLT, brilliant kids. Within easy reach of Cambridge and north Essex / Herfordshire. 'Outstanding' across the board from Ofsted in 2024. www.swchs.net/blog/?pid=37...swchs.netTeacher of Maths 034
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 16/01/2025New opening in my lovely department. Wonderful colleagues, very supportive SLT, brilliant kids. Within easy reach of Cambridge and north Essex / Herfordshire. 'Outstanding' across the board from Ofsted in 2024. www.swchs.net/blog/?pid=37...swchs.netTeacher of Maths 034
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 10/01/2025I think they might be slightly reformatted Dr Frost Maths ones, actually. 120
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 10/01/2025#mathstoday Saw a colleague doing a cute version of a classic. Old Boniface he took his cheer, Then he bored a hole through a solid sphere, Clear through the centre, straight and strong, And the hole was just six inches long. Now tell me, when the end was gained, What volume in the sphere remained? 062
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 19/12/2024According my students, this is what I’d look like if transported, TRON-style, inside Desmos. 051
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 17/12/2024#MathsToday -ish. I failed to convince everyone in my Y12 class that finding the nth term of p-gon numbers was a suitable end-of-term activity - part of my ongoing campaign to stop them cranking out algebra and consider structure first. But maths did win the fancy dress, so that cheered me up. 0112
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 15/12/2024#MathsToday -ish. Two tasks from Key Stage 3 that we come back to in Key Stage 5. (Sadly didn't have any of my current Year 13s in Year 7/8, which always makes this more amusing.) 052
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 10/12/2024Not for exam technique but it feels useful for the kids just to construct the concentric circles through the vertices. We could maybe do that next year when we split up that oversized Y10 block on similarity congruence and transformations. I’d like constructions built into the congruence part. 020
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 07/12/2024Yup. Wiggles and blobs. Who could ask more of a graph? 000
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 07/12/2024#MathsToday -ish. 'Sir, what the heck is that doing there?' 4407
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 29/11/2024#MathsToday I have been skiving lessons to go on a Heads of Maths beano. Currently on the way back to school where tonight there will be the second mathsy-sounding music event in recent weeks. Missed the Moog Ensemble to go to MathsConf, looking forward to Year 9 with Sö this evening. 140
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 26/11/2024donsteward.blogspot.com/2015/04/pyth...donsteward.blogspot.compythagoras and surd formsideas and resources for mathematics teachers of 10 to 16 year olds 010
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 23/11/2024There are some on that Chris McGrane book. I think Tim the Trainee has our copy at the mo. 120
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 23/11/2024This is the one I do most often with the kids. (And was also the first thing I used to do with trainees.) 010
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 23/11/2024Strong agree. Also, private tutors who counsel against it should be struck off. 000
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 22/11/2024Yes. We mark them as a department, so it reflects how I felt flicking through the papers to see what the patterns were 010
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 22/11/2024Generally the easy ones, which I reckon is the correct answer. 010
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 22/11/2024I just judged it by my emotional reaction to them getting a given question wrong 110
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 22/11/2024#MathsToday Adventures in over-complicated mock feedback. Actually, this worked quite well as an opener on what they need to think about when closing the gap. 3152
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 21/11/2024Not one that was good enough. I see it as a line being dragged out to the circumference as the sum increases. Some of them got fairly quickly to an answer for 1x + 1y, at which point I thought we were away. But we needed more time to reflect on other simple cases before the a and b appeared. 010
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 21/11/2024It is a cute answer! There was lots of dragging lines around on Geogebra to convince the kids. But felt like too quick an abstraction for about half the class. It would be nice to make a lesson that builds to it as a way of entertaining the Furthers while they’re doing Single maths content. 110
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 21/11/2024#MathsToday A day of parameters. Year 11 happily chomping through parameters as coefficients. But Year 12 confuddled by this question, which needs to graduate to its own lesson rather than being tagged on the end of the circles topic - there must be a nice family of questions in there somewhere. 1171
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 17/11/2024This is also a nice one… www.mathshelper.co.uk/alevel_docs/...mathshelper.co.uk 010
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 05/11/2024Maybe we need to show that lad some of these comments. 010
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 04/11/2024#MathsToday Quadratic formula with Y12, thinking about where the -b/2a bit is on the graph and what it means to +- (b^2-4ac)^0.5/2a to get to the roots, even if roots are complex. Looked at 'phantom graphs', had fun, but next year I really need get around to planning a task not just a discussion. 0102
Jonathan Dunning @mayorofsimpleton.bsky.social · 01/11/2024More than most ideas, I find it hard to see inside the kids heads on understanding of graphs. I have a theory (which I can’t support with any evidence) that the kids, and the formative assessment, suffer from typically seeing such a narrow range of equations graphically early on. 010