What Makes a Great Task?

Last weekend I was taking part in the Mathematical Association Annual Conference.

One of the sessions I attended was Jo Morgan's (@mathsjem on Twitter). Her session was all about what makes a great task.

I had a go at making Sketch Notes during the session, first time doing it live.

The style of task which really caught my attention was forwards and backwards tasks. Jo showed an example of some graph tasks where the students were asked to both plot the graph and extract the data from the graph.

This particularly resonated as I was planning the workbook for my Y10 class who are doing a graphs unit next. I've often found it a struggle to get enough practice done without it being repetitious, forwards and backwards tasks seemed like an excellent solution to this. I'll report back later on the success of the tasks

I've created tasks for the graphs and charts needed for the unit

Here is a link for the PPT and PDF copies of the tasks. Credit to