The practise section contains randomly generated equations to solve.
The equations range in difficulty from one and two-step equations to harder equations involving quadratics, algebraic fractions or simultaneous equations.
Answers are marked instantly and saved so that points can be awarded, depending on the difficulty of the question.
Students can track their progress and compare their scores on the leaderboards.
How should I write my answers?
Answers must be written as fractions in their simplest form. You should use improper (top-heavy) fractions rather than mixed numbers.
Use a forward slash / to make a fraction. For example, 2/3 is the solution to 3x=2.
Fractions are generally better than decimals as decimals are often rounded, losing accuracy. It also makes it easier to solve equations such as 7x=1.
You don't need to write x= in your answer. Just use the value of x, y or z.
Negatives should always go at the front of an answer, such as -1/3.
For simultaneous equations, please enter your answer as (x,y) coordinates.
How do I earn points?
Each fully correct answer will award you points, depending on the difficulty of the question.
For the first question on each stage you will earn points equal to the stage squared.
This is multipled by 1,2 or 3 depending on which question is correct.
For example, the second question on stage 5 will give you 5*5*2 = 50 points.
Stage
Q1
Q2
Q3
1
1
2
3
2
4
8
12
3
9
18
27
4
16
32
48
5
25
50
75
6
36
72
108
7
49
98
147
8
64
128
192
9
81
162
243
How do I earn medals?
For each stage, a medal is awarded for each set of three correct questions.
You can spread this out over multiple attempts, so you may prefer to start on the first question and only move onto the second when confident.
When you earn 100 medals you have completed the stage and will need to move onto a different stage. This also applies to any one question that has been solved 100 times.
What is Stage X?
Stage X can be accessed when you complete RecklessMaths. This happens when you have earned 100 medals on each stage or have 100% completion.
Stage X contains very difficult equations. These will be locked until you are ready for the challenge.
Where can I find help?
Full written solutions are shown every time you attempt a question.
These show the recommended method for each equation. You are welcome to use any method that is mathematically valid.
You can also find video solutions in the videos section.
Try asking your friends, searching on the internet or asking a teacher if you get stuck.
What do the leaderboards show?
The leaderboards show the top ten students in each year group for the date range chosen (7 days, 1 month or 1 year).
The leaderboards are reset every time you reload the page. They show all the points scored within the date range.
Your teachers may reward students who are consistently at the top.
What does progress show?
In the progress section you can find your completion percentage, total score and play time.
You can also see your rank within your school, year and class.
This is only displayed for the top 25% of students in your school, year or class.
The results section shows you how many questions you have correctly answered on each stage.
The progress graph shows your point score over time, relative to the average person in your class and year group.
Is it possible to cheat?
RecklessMaths tracks how quickly and accurately you answer questions, together with other statistics on how you answer questions.
Any suspicious activity will be flagged and may be removed.
Calculators should not be used as all questions can be solved with fractions or whole numbers.
General advice
Show as much working as possible when solving an equation. That way, if you make a mistake, you can check your answer very easily.
Start with the easier stages and progress through them in the recommended order.
Miniwhiteboards are very useful for quickly solving equations.
Tracking
Staff can filter by individual or by class, using the relevant progress section.
This allows teachers to set a custom date range to see if pupils have logged on, how many points they have earned in this time and how long they have spent solving questions.
It will also show which questions have been solved correctly, which could be used to monitor homework.
The data can be exported as a spreadsheet for further analysis, such as identifying those working well above, or below, the class average.
Tips for teachers
Rewards can be used for those students that are on the leaderboards
Computers and phones can be used in lessons. Performance can be monitored live for effective intervention.
Students may need to be reminded to use fractions rather than decimals.
Encourage students to check their progress and set them challenges of completing stages.
Miniwhiteboards allow for an efficient and low-stakes way to solve equations.
Account Creation
Accounts can only be created by staff.
This is done by uploading a spreadsheet (xlsx or csv) containing the First Name, Last Name, Email, Year Group and Class of each student and teacher.
The first row of the spreadsheet showing the column titles will be ignored.
The name field is used for the leaderboards but initials or pseudonyms could be used if desired.
The email field must contain the valid school email address of each user. This guarantees that only people within your school will be able to access your data.
The year group field is used to allow staff to filter progress by year, for leaderboards, and for student progress graphs. This could be a number (such as 7,8,9,10,11) or a string (such as Year 7).
Staff accounts must have Staff as a year group. Anyone with this designation will have full access to tracking and user account data.
The class field is used to group students together for tracking purposes. For example, 07A1.
The default password will be set for each new account. Users will be forced to change this when they first log on to ensure security.
Your school information manager may be able to help you to efficiently export this data from your information management system.
Validation of your upload will check for missing data, invalid email addresses and other anomalies.
Account Deletion
Teachers are in charge of account deletion and should upload a list of usernames for deletion.
Use the account backup facility to identify inactive users for deletion.
Any teacher can erase data. This is irreversible.
All data (including answer and tracking data) related to these users will be permanently erased.
Contact
Feel free to contact Mr Frederick Reckless (admin@recklessmaths.com) with questions, suggestions or requests.