Thinking resources

Students colour and cut out 4 shapes and fit them together to make tessellating patterns.

Students compare different types of quadrilateral shapes and answer questions about which of a pair is a special case of the other one.

For this practical task students follow a plan to determine the best temperature for the reaction of rennet with milk. Students need to make observations and write a report on their findings.

Task: Students decide what sort of animals two skulls belong to. A self-assessment checklist is included. Assessment focus: using evidence to identify carnivores and herbivores.

Task: Look for the similarities and differences in leaf patterns to answer questions about observations and evidence.

Task: Look for similarities and differences in fruit to answer questions about observation and evidence.

Students look closely at a photograph taken on the beach and record their observations. They think and write about the consequences of the things they see.

Students combine their observations with some information provided to complete a story about what might have happened in the photograph.

In this activity students progressively build up evidence for and against a new idea in pest control: using bumblebees to transmit a fungicide. Students practise argumentation skills and reflect on how they formulate opinions on environmental issues.

Students are required to compare sales represented on line graphs of the total sales and the pattern of sales over time.

Students are required to explain the misleading aspects of two graphs found in newspaper articles.

Students enlarge a shape made of cubes and explore the relationship between the scale factor and volume.

Students write algebraic expressions which make equations true.

Students interpret a back-to-back bar graph about apples picked by comparing and identifying patterns.

Task: Sort cards to identify how four items of rubbish will impact on the beach, plants and animals that are found there, and humans. They then select items to remove and leave, and justify their decisions. Assessment focus: impact of materials on the environment.

Task: Predict, observe and explain what will happen when a balloon containing another balloon filled with water is thrown. Assessment focus: making and explaining predictions and observations.

Students use the scaled plan of a property to calculate the area of the pool, house, and lawn.

In this practical task, students use their understanding of the link between capacity and volume to make cardboard containers that hold 250ml and 500ml of water.

In this practical task, students make different shapes with four multi-link cubes, draw them, identify the smallest perimeter, and explain what happens to the area.

Students identify which of four shapes created from equilateral triangles has the largest area and which has the largest perimeter.

Students explain why two people will get different totals when measuring a room using their hand span.

In this practical task students design a net for a lidded cardboard box to hold 3 "chocolate bars" represented by hundreds blocks. They then cut out and construct the box.

Students cut out tangram shapes and arrange them to fit two different ways into rectangle outlines and once into a triangle outline.

Students use a quadrilateral key to answer questions about attributes of quadrilaterals.

Students draw lines on shapes to show how they have been constructed from four smaller shapes.