Throughout the the world schools have been closed to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus. This closure will likely be for a long time and yet we still need to continue with our learning from our homes.

I suggest that you take this time to build up your MENTAL MATHEMATICS knowledge, which means that you remember many calculations as facts rather than having to work them out by hand or with the help of a calculator.

It has been my experience, in more than 50 years of tutoring mathematics, that mental mathematics expertise is not well developed and I find many Grade 12 Mathematics learners who do not know the multiplication table up to 12×12 and who use their fingers to count out basic calculations such as 6×8. This situation is not acceptable and you now have the time to work on this with other schoolwork largely suspended.

I am providing many short lessons, with documents for downloading, which will help you to develop your mental mathematics skills and you can work on these by yourself and with help from your parents. You may also wish to work with your fellow learners in a group using social media apps.

START HERE: Mental Mathematics Series.

These lessons will be updated over time so please come back often to see how this is being updated. We will soon be asking you to create an account (free!) so that we can keep you informed by our newsletters on the learning of mathematics.

Welcome to mathematics.co.za

This mathematics.co.za web site is dedicated to helping to improve the standards of mathematics for all learners in South Africa. It is primarily aimed at school-level learners and teachers, and is also a useful resource for anyone interested in mathematics.

My initial focus is to assist Grade 12 learners in preparing for the Grade 12 examinations. My other focus is to ensure that all learners of mathematics have the background to succeed at mathematics, and this entails finding the areas of weakness and fixing these so that they become strengths.

All new topics in mathematics draw on prior mathematics and when this prior mathematics is understood and can be applied, you will find it far easier to grasp new topics.

My vision for this web site is to bring as many people as possible up to full proficiency in mathematics and to gain confidence in mathematics. Whereas mathematics is often regarded as a hard subject I hope to show that it can be learned and that this knowledge can be sustained over time as you progress through your studies and through life.

This site is continually being updated and improved, as it gains structure, and I look forward to sharing the path with you on the wonderful journey of mathematics.

Roger Layton, PhD (Mathematics Education)