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Magic Mathworks Travelling Circus
Experiencing Mathematics through Sight, Sound, Touch and Movement

Maths club projects

The Scottish Bubble and the Irish Bubble

A Maths Club Project: The Elementary Mathematics in an Advanced Problem

Our subject is the ‘Kelvin’ problem. But we enter it via two related problems: the ‘Tammes’ problem and the ‘Kepler’ problem. All three require us to think about spheres in some way.

The contents of this document are intended for the leader of the maths club. The material is of 3 different kinds:

  • history – the problems in their historical setting: how they arose, how people first tackled them;
  • calculation: what students of school age can work out for themselves;
  • experiment: what the students can do and make.

Scottish Bubble and the Irish Bubble (pdf)

Lines in Space

Exploring ruled surfaces with cans, paper, Polydron, wool and shirring elastic.

Lines in Space (pdf)

Number City for Teachers

The ‘City’ blocks record the occurrences of prime factors in the sequence of counting numbers.

Number City for Teachers (pdf)

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