Get stuck in to some maths themed seasonal crafts with our Sierpinski Christmas tree! The Sierpinski triangle is a pattern of equilateral triangles that repeats again and again at different scales. This kind of pattern is called a 'fractal'. Our tree is a large pyramid made of smaller pyramids. Since a fractal can repeat endlessly, you can keep adding layers to build a tree as large as you want!
Today you'll need to get your thinking caps on again - fill the squares on the grid with the correct colours, with the help of the coordinates, to reveal our festive mystery picture!
Happy (belated) Christmas Jumper Day! If, like us, you didn’t get the memo that Christmas Jumper Day was a day early this year, you can have some festive jumper fun with today’s activity. Download our free activity sheet and design your own jumper. Can you give it a mathematical twist? How about adding some shapes, repeating patterns, tessellation or symmetry!
In our festive Sudoku for kids, cut out the stars and place them on the grid so that you have one star of each colour in every row, column and 2x2 or 3x2 block. There are two different levels of difficulty to chose from.
In this fun Christmas art activity, you need to create pictures just by colouring in squares - no extra diagonal or rounded lines allowed! Try our suggestions or create your own!
Bonus suggestion: If you are into cross stitch, you could also use these doodles as cross stitch patterns, with each square equalling one stitch.
It's the perfect time of year to cuddle down with a good book. With plenty of counting books for kids to choose from, it's also a great opportunity to include some maths in your seasonal story time.
What are your favourite seasonal books to read at this time of year?
A tessellation is an arrangement of shapes fitting together in a repeating pattern without gaps or overlapping. Download our template and fit together the tessellating trees to make one giant tree! The template includes three sizes of tree to choose from. This is a great activity to do with a group or class, or at a family gathering.
Tip: It’s easier to colour the trees in first and then cut them out.
Today we're sending you on a secret holiday mission! But the message for your mission has been encrypted. Use the keyword cipher to work out what it is.
There’s two ways to play our Decorate-a-Tree game. In Best of 5, the player with the most points after five rounds wins. In First to 20, it’s the player to reach 20 points first.
For an extra challenge, try to reach 20 points exactly on your last throw – so if e.g. you have 17 points, you need to roll a 3 to win. If you roll a higher number, you’ll need to try again in the next round.
Four friends are planning a party for New Year's Eve. Each of them is bring one decoration and one item of party food. Can you work out who is bringing what? There’s two difficulty levels to choose from. In Level 2 you’ll also need to work out what colour party hat each friend is wearing.
>> Download Logic Puzzle (Level 1)
>> Download Logic Puzzle (Level 2)
A calming art puzzle activity for the weekend. Cut out circles of different sizes from white paper, then cut some in to halves, quarters and eighths. Use the circle fractions to lay out snowflake patterns. Remember, snowflakes are symmetrical!
Today we’re making seasonal decorations with a mathematical twist – using binary code! Download our chart and create ornaments with festive words written in binary code. Binary code is a way to write numbers, letters and symbols using only 0 and 1. It is used in computer coding.
Get ready for some seasonal counting fun! How many of each of the symbols can you find? For a bonus activity, colour them all in.
Some Christmas fun doodling with numbers! Try our suggestions, or make up your own. And don't forget to share pictures of your artworks with us!
Can you help Jingles the elf find his way to the Christmas present in our Christmas Maze? There are three levels of difficulty to choose from.
>> Download Christmas Maze (easy)
>> Download Christmas Maze (medium)
>> Download Christmas Maze (advanced)
Three Christmas tongue twisters have been encrypted as secret messages below, using Pigpen Cipher. Can you crack the code?
You can also try encrypting your own messages, using our Cryptography resource developed by the Open University
>> Download Code Cracker Challenge
>> Download Cryptography Resource
It’s time to get the paints out for this activity, as we make some ‘Symmetrees’ (sorry, we couldn’t resist the pun…)
In this tutorial, we will show you how to draw a perfect 5-point star.
>> Download Step-by-Step Tutorial
>> Watch full-length Tutorial Video
Happy Christmas Jumper Day! In this logic puzzle, use the clues to work out who wants to buy each of the festive jumpers.
This fun activity with a maths twist has two phases: first you make the game, then you play the game. You could make other animals too.
In our festive, cut out the symbols and place them on the grid so that you have one of each symbol in every row, column and block. There are three different levels of difficulty to choose from.
>> Download Festive Sudoku (easy)
>> Download Festive Sudoku (medium)
>> Download Festive Sudoku (advanced)
In this activity we are going to be making ‘gingerbread’ house decorations out of recycled cardboard, and decorating them with shapes and symmetrical patterns.