I have decided to move my “links to the best maths websites in the world” page to my blog to make it easier to update. To return to the Teachers section of my main website, just click here.

On this page I will list my go-to websites and blogs that have saved me hours and given  me so many lovely lessons and ideas over the years. Some will be familiar to you, but hopefully there will be a few hidden gems in there. If you know of any I have missed out, please drop me an email.

Also, please check out my “Essential Freebies” page, for lots of lovely free maths goodies!

Index

Single Purpose Maths Websites

Rich Maths Problems

Making Data and Statistics Interesting

Best of the Maths Blogs

Best of the Maths Resources Websites

Best of the Rest

 

Single Purpose Maths Websites (back to index)

A pleasing trend in recent years has been the emergence of “single purpose” maths website – sites that do one specific thing, and do it very, very well. Here is a list of some of my favourites.

diagnostic questions
Okay, so I am (more than!) a little biased on this one as it is my own website, but it is free and I created it as there was nothing else like it on the web, so I hope you will forgive me! It is designed to help teachers identify key misconceptions in students’ understanding and to help students all around the world learn from each other. See my “how to videos” or the “question of the week” feature for more information.

estimation 180
Andrew Stadel shares his collection of maths pictures for students to discuss and estimate. A wonderful way to develop number sense in a thoroughly engaging way.

visual patterns
Fawn Nguyen has produced this lovely site where you can find hundreds of interesting patterns for students to investigate. Can they draw the next pattern? How many ways can they find to describe how the pattern grows? Can they convince you how many would be in the 100th pattern?

maths pret homeworks
Interesting, engaging, challenging homeworks, testing a full range of skills, all for free. See my video on this wonderful website here.

which one doesn’t belong?
A lovely website which presents students with 4 things (they could be numbers, graphs, shapes, etc) and asks them to argue which one doesn’t belong. This can foster really rich, meaningful discussions, especially if you challenge students to come up with an argument why each one item not belong.

graphing stories
A wonderful website for helping students develop skills in plotting real life graphs. The videos are perfect hooks, and there is a handy students website provided. My personal favourite is the bench press!

would you rather?
A great source of images and discussion points for students to use their maths skills in real life and interesting situations

daily desmos
Each day students are presented with a graph and they must discover its equation. A wonderful way to encourage student to investigate the properties of functions and their graphs

math mistakes
A teacher takes pictures of his students’ mistakes. Makes for wonderful discussions with your students as they attempt to explain the mistake/misconception that led to the problem

all the news that’s fit to math
A collection of real life news stories that feature an element of mathematics

 

Rich Maths Problems (back to index)

I absolutely love activities, investigations, puzzles and problems that challenge students of all ages and abilities to think deeper about their mathematics. Familiar topics presented in an interesting, original way tend to engage students a lot more. The following websites are my favourite places to find these.

my rich maths tasks
My own attempt to collect together some of my favourite problems, along with questions and prompts for discussion.

venn diagram activities
I am obsessed with these types of activities to generate challenge across a whole variety of topics

median maths blog by don steward
If you have never visited this blog before, make sure you are sitting down securely, as this will knock you out of your chair. Rich, innovate, original ideas for activities for 11 to 16 year olds. One of the best things I have ever seen. Don Steward should be knighted.

open middle problems
I love the idea of an open-middle problems: problems that have a fixed start and a definite answer, but which students can solve ib many different ways.

math arguments 180
Absolutely brillaint daily ideas, puzzles and stimuli for interesting maths discussions

UKMT maths challenge past papers
Past paper electronic copies of the junior, intermediate and senior maths challenges make excellent starter activities for all ages and abilities. download a few and give them a go!

five triangles
An amazing collection of puzzles and rich problems for all ages of students

math pickle – unsolved problems
What a great idea – to take some of the most famous unsolved maths problems and to rework them into concepts primary and secondary school students can understand. Engaging the great mathematicians of the future!

3 act math
I’ve been obsessed with “3 act math” lessons for a few years now. Hook students in with an intriguing problem, let them request information and try to solve it, and then see how close they were. Click the links below for some of the best collection of 3 act math tasks around:
Dan Meyer demoing the pile of coins task
Dan Meyer post on running  3 act math tasks
Dan Meyer task collection
Andrew Stadel task collection
Mr Picc task collection
Kyle Pearce collection

nrich
Nrich is so much more than a website of puzzles. These are rich tasks of the highest quality to challenge, stimulate and engage students of all ages and abilities. There are also curriculum mapping documents which show how all these puzzles and activities fit into the national framework to spice up the dullest of topics. Not only this, but there are some really good articles aimed specifically at teachers, some offering advice, others giving exciting angles into topics. Brilliant!

mathematical beginnings
A lovely idea, similar in some ways to 3 Act Math above. Each “beginning” is a picture designed to stimulate mathematical discussion. There are 40 of these, complete with prompts and teacher notes.

numberphile
Much to my wife’s annoyance, I watch one of these wonderful videos each week. But even she liked the pi/pie one! So many ideas for rich discussion, and an unrivalled insight into the history and current developments in mathematics in a way students (and me!) can understand

bowland maths activities
the excellent Bowland Case Studies have been around for a while now, offering high-quality rich investigational style projects. however, a more recent addition is 35 outstanding Assessment Tasks, complete with full teacher notes and supporting material

nuffield AMP Investigations
When you see the name “Nuffiled” attached to a maths resource, you know you are talking quality. these are 20 amazing rich investigational/practical tasks, complete with teacher guidance and probing questions. outstanding

 

Making Data and Statistics Interesting (back to index)

I absolutely love statistics, and so it breaks my mathematical heart when I hear students (and teachers!) say they do not like it. Here are some of my favourite website to help get everyone loving a bit of lovely data!

guardian data blog
Finding relevant , reliable and engaging data to use in the classroom can be an absolute nightmare. But with the Guardian Data Blog you are guaranteed to find what you are looking for, and often find something amazing that you were not looking for!

gapminder world 
I have never seen my students more engaged in statistics in my life. I have done a series of videos on making use of Gapminder in the classroom here.

dotty thinking
an idea I have used for data collection loads over the last few years. You will find all the resources and a video explaining how it works on TES via the link above

plotly
A fascinating tool to encourage data analysis and visualization across disciplines. For years I have made do with Excel for all my statistical diagram needs, but the potential for something as slick, intuitive and visually impressive as this is huge. Definitely worth a proper look.

tsm data
If you are ever in need of some interesting data to spice up a lesson (and i have found it makes a big difference to students’ levels of engagement) then this is the place to go. scroll down to the tsm-data zip file.

graph of the week
A wonderful blog where each week students are given a graph to analyse and comment on. Ideal for getting better at interpreting different statistical representations. There is a useful writing frame provided as well.

google data viewer
An alternative to Gapminder World and Nation Master (see below). Google offers lots of data sets and lots of different ways of displaying them, including scatter diagrams and bar charts. Ideal for making statistics lessons more relevant and engaging

nation master
With Nationmaster you can very quickly and clearly make comparisons between countries using thousands of interesting, up to date statistics. Its ability to then dig out both positive and negative correlations and direct you to related statistics make this website, in my opinion, a must visit before teaching any data handling topics. See my WebWhizz video here

google ngram viewer
I really like this. Google collated data on every word in every one of the books that they have on Google Books and allowed you to display statisics on them. To get you started, try compaing the use of “garlic” and “onion” over time…

 

Best of the Maths Blogs (back to index)

The following Blogs are my favourites. I visit them at least once a week, and where possible I subscribe to them so that I get notified each time a new entry is posted. This is now my Number 1 way of keeping up to date with the latest ideas, resources and developments in teaching. They are fascinating reads by talented, generous people, that give me amazing ideas and save me bucket loads of time. I hope you find them useful as well.

maths, learning and web 2.0
Colleen Young’s was one of the first mathematics blogs I discovered, and still one of the best around. Regularly updated with links to some of the most exciting and innovative maths resources, ideas and practices. A must visit.

resourceaholic 
Jo Morgan shares her experiences in the classroom and documents her favourite resources. Her Maths Gems series in particular is well worth a read.

solve my maths
A wonderful blog full of resources, puzzles, Gif of the Day and outstanding revision materials. There’s even some Mr Men on there as well.

just maths blog
Mel is a great blogger, documenting her experiences, ideas and experiments as second in department. Loads of links to high quality free resources as well.

dy/dan
Dan Meyer is one of the most inspirational and innovative bloggers on the planet. His blog and the resources and ideas he links to are must reads

cav maths
Some excellent teaching ideas and lots of free resources to download from a UK based teacher

mr reddy
A great read from an inspirational teacher with loads of fascinating ideas.

matheminutes
A really interesting blog that covers everything from the reciprocals of complex numbers to the death of Fibonacci’s rabbits. Brilliant stuff.

great maths teaching ideas
Quite a grand name for a blog, but I am pleased to say that William Emney lives up to his billing. Loads of great ideas and links to fantastic resources!

maths sandpit
Amazing ideas and resources shared by a very generous and talented teacher

to infinity and beyond
A secondary school maths teacher with some excellent ideas for the classroom

reflective maths teacher
Another excellent blog crammed full of great ideas and resources. Book yourself in for regular visits!

mr collins blog
An exciting blog from a student from the GTP program, now teaching full time. Excellent ideas and resources tried and tested in the classroom

flying colours
The blog from the author of the Maths for Dummies series contains some really interesting ideas and thoughts

 

Best of the Maths Resources Websites  (back to index)

If you are looking for free maths resources on a variety of topics, then these are good websites to start.

TES maths resources
Again, I am a little biased here as I am the TES Maths Adviser, but there are 1000s of top quality resources, all free, written by kind, generous and talented teachers who want to share their work. Check out my Resource of the Week feature to see some of the very best of them.

mathed up
An amazing website that keeps getting better! Crammed full of PowerPoint, EasiTeach and Tarsia Jigsaw resources for all topics, and all for free! The A Level section is one of the best around. Brilliant!

missbsresources.com
A wonderful website by teacher, Danielle Bartram, jam-packed full of high quality resources, homeworks and worksheets.

suffolk maths
A truly excellent website from AST, Mark Greenaway. Loads of stuff on here from resources, revision guides, advice, links, and pretty much anything else you could want. And see my “Essential Freebies” page to download Mark’s entire collection of lessons in one go!

interactive-maths
Lots of free, high quality resources, many of the ICT based, including Autograph and GeoGebra files. The Quick Question Interface in particular is well worth a look (see blog post here for more information).

the chalk face
Loads of excellent resources, covering a whole host of topics in lots of different formats. The A Level section is very impressive.

corbett maths
Videos, practise questions, maths mistakes, conundrums, and of the course world famous 5-a-day. What a website!

CIMT
It’s hard to know where to start with this website, because there is just so much good stuff on it. I have linked you straight to the home page, and I would suggest you scroll down and have a look at the CIMT Resources section. There are free notes, exercises for the pupils to do, puzzles, competitions, and real world applications of maths. If you’ve got a spare twenty minutes (or 20 hours), have a good look around. I have also collated the best of the resources (with answers) here.

TSM resources
Douglas Butler’s amazing website with links to just aobut every brilliant website in the world. You could quite easily spend a day looking through this. The For the Busy Teacher section is particuarly impressive

kenny’s pouch
Kenny’s pouch is like a gift from the gods. so much brilliant stuff, and all completely free. dig in and see what you can find. my personal recommendation are the key state 3 level ladders, and the key stage 4 make the grade worksheets. both are simply brilliant for revision.

number loving
The resource bank here is truly phenominal. You won’t find many boring PowerPoints and worksheets. Oh no, on Number Loving you will come across mysteries, collective memories, treasure hunts, top trumps, and much, much more. Here we look at 5 resources just to give you a flavour of what this amazing website has to offer.

illuminations
A brilliant website which offers lesson plans, complete with resources, which are often a bit more interactive for the pupils than they usually might be. The website is really well organised and there is some truly excellent stuff on here.

webmaths
A really nice website, jam-packed full of top quality resources. There are PowerPoints, GSP files, and lots of those Tarsia Jigsaws that I just can’t do without. Definitely worth a visit!

brain-cells
Top quality maths resources for teachers and students. Some are available for purchase, but plenty of free stuff on there as well. The GCSE Revision resources are definitely worth a visit.

e maths
A simply brilliant website which has had an impressive makeover. Not only are there bucket loads of resources (all for free, of course), but also there is lots of advice for teachers, as well as interactive schemes of work and good website links, and that’s just the teacher section! Very good.

math centre
I was slow to pick up on this website, but now I am a convert! For teaching A Level Maths, this website is simply brilliant. Pick the topic from the menu on the left, and then watch all the resources appear. What I like best of all is the variety of resources, from nice little leaflets covering all the main facts, the video tutorials. Brilliant!

maths sphere
A nice simple collection of free maths resources. What more could you ask for?

 

 

The Best of the Rest (back to index)

And here are some other websites that didn’t fit into the categorises above, but are definitely worth a visit!

the on-line encyclopedia of integer sequences
Something a bit different here. It is an encyclopedia cataloguing well over 100,000 integer sequences. Sounds boring?… surely not… but what I like about it is not only is every sequence discussed and links provided, there is also the option to graph each sequence, and hear the sound of the terms played on a piano. My top recommendation is Recaman’s Sequence, which is so simple to construct, but so difficult to explain!

maths careers
A nice website which attempts (and almost succeeds) to answer the eternal question: “sir, what use is this in real life?”. Also provides information on careers involving maths and really good links to newspaper articles and other resources.

wolfram alpha
There are few search engines that can rival Google, but for a mathematician, Wolfram Alpha certainly comes close. It is incredibly powerful and incredibly fun too. Are Craigs more popular than Kates and how often are people talking about mathematics? Wolfram Alpha has the answer. See my WebWhizz video here and check out my Wolfram Alpha Widgets

history of maths
The best website around for information about famous (and not so famous) mathematicians. I would also heartily recommend following them on twitter at @MathsHistory, as you get sent a Mathematician of the Day tweet every single day!

gresham college
A nice website where you can find archives of interesting maths lectures, which can either be downloaded as videos or audio files, or if not then they can be streamed over the internet. There is lots of good stuff here.

misconceptions
A really nice idea. The authors have got together the 8 maths topics they consider to contain the biggest misconceptions in pupils (and they promise another 16 soon!), and they offer examples, advice, and exercises on how to correct them. Very good!

the nuffield foundation
A cracking website with starters, assignments, skills activities and investigation ideas for all ages and abilities

i love maths games
A really nice website full of original and fun maths games and puzzles.

further maths network
The number one website if you are teaching further maths. Some of the stuff you have to pay for, but there are plenty of excellent free resources on there as well.

the futures channel
A brilliant website which has video clips and lesson plans for what many maths teachers consider to be the Holy Grail… examples of real life maths! The stuff on there already is very good, and new content seems to be being added all the time. Definitely worth a look!

khan academy
One of the most controversial maths website around (let’s be honest, there aren’t many others). Thousands of videos taking students step-by-step through how to solve lots of questions. It’s not for everybody, but it is certainly worth a look.

TES maths forum
One of the few websites I visit every day. Maths practitioners from all over the world asking questions, sharing ideas and giving answers (and the occasional rant).

NCETM secondary maths forum
An open community for mathematical discussion. Worth a visit.