Primary Maths

The equation 12 multiplied by a number equals 72. To find the missing number, we need to divide 72 by 12. The result is 6, which is the missing number that, when multiplied by 12, equals 72.

Although triangles are pointy, and roofs and sandwiches can often take the shape of a triangle, roofs, sandwiches and pointy things are not always triangles. Tri means 3 and angle means angle, therefore, the best description is a two dimensional shape with three sides and three angles.

½ means one of two pieces, or, one half. The question ½ X 10 is the same as asking for half of 10. If you divide ten in half you are left with two groups of five. One of these groups, or one half, would equal 5.

The given pattern is a sequence where each number is halved to get the next number. Starting with 256, we divide it by 2 to get 128. Then, we divide 128 by 2 to get 64, and so on. Therefore, the next number in the pattern would be 16, as we divide 32 by 2.

52 or 5 squared means 5 X 5. The little two lets you know how many times the number is multiplied by itself. 52 means that when you write it out, there will be two 5s in the equation (5 X 5). Bigger numbers mean you multiply it more times, for example 53 would mean 5 X 5 X 5, 54 would mean 5 X 5 X 5 X 5 etc.

When looking at a two dimensional shape (2D), such as a square, it can be measured in two ways, height (up and down) and width (left and right). A three dimensional shape (3D), such as a cube, can be measured by its height (up and down), width (left and right) and depth (in and out).

0.60 is the same as 6/10 because when we divide 60 by 10, we get 6. The number 6 represents the numerator in the fraction, and the number 10 represents the denominator. Therefore, the fraction 6/10 is equivalent to the decimal 0.60.

Any 2D shape with four sides and four angles (corners) is known as a Quadrilateral (Quad means 4). Shapes that we call squares, rectangles, parallelograms etc. Each have four sides and four angles and so are types of Quadrilaterals. The shapes below are all examples of Quadrilaterals.

Milli means 1000 in Latin, a language spoken long ago by the Ancient Romans. Units of measurement such as centimetre, kilometre, each have a prefix that explains what they mean. For example, millimetre literally means “1000 pieces of a metre.”
Prefix Symbol Value Example Meaning
Milli m One thousandth of 1 mm 1 millimetre
Centi c One hundredth of 1 cm 1 centimetre
Deci d One Tenth of 1 dB 1 decibel
Kilo k 1000 times 1 kg 1 kilogram
Mega M 1 million times 1 ML 1 Megalitre
Giga G 1 thousand million times 1 GB 1gigabyte