Numeracy Across theSecondary Curriculum is aimed directly at supporting mathematics departments in administrating the demands of numeracy across the curriculum.

It sets out to provide methods and procedures whereby a department in a secondary school can survey the maths being used in other subjects and then compare timing and methods of teaching. It also indicates how debate can be started between the subject areas as to how the maths in question can be addressed by the respective departments.

Maths across the curriculum is clearly a major priority for the national numeracy strategy, and similarly with literacy. Initial teacher training is being asked to address these issues. Previous national curriculums in maths have done little to help maths departments gauge where and when maths is needed within other subject areas. They have almost encouraged maths teachers to disregard the demands of other subjects. Even the latest version provides only a one-way reference system, indicating to other subjects the demand for maths, but not to maths teachers what maths might be used, when and where.

This volume is therefore very timely and useful. However, it is a pity that the editing has not been as thorough as it might have been. For example, at least one work referred to in the text is not referenced in the bibliography and what is meant to be Appendix 2, from the table of contents, is consistently labelled Appendix 3, giving two Appendix 3s.

Adapting and Extending Secondary Mathematics Activities is entirely different.

It presents ways of developing existing materials and resources, textbooks, ICT, apparatus, and so on to produce a wealth of additional material that can be used for differentiation, extended mathematical tasks or simply further practice.

As such it requires no extra resources and thus represents something of a magic lantern. However, you have to be prepared to learn how to rub the lantern; it does not promise something for nothing.

The book therefore needs to be read with pencil and paper to hand. It is not as overtly challenging as Brown and Walter’s excellent volume, The Art of Problem Posing, (to which the authors acknowledge a debt), but the armchair reader will gain little from it without some commitment to working alongside the authors as they take you through their thought processes and encourage you to develop your own.

The book represents work, and an approach to the teaching of maths, that Stephanie Prestage and Pat Perks have been developing for some time. As such it speaks to the reader with assurance and confidence. This has worked for us and for many others, the text says, and encourages the reader to see if it could work for you.

Examples from PGCE students and experienced teachers lend credence to the methods offered.

This volume has the potential to turn a department’s ordinary resources into something new and challenging for pupils. It also offers teachers the possibility of originality in their own teaching, something well worth working for.

Tom Roper is a senior lecturer in mathematics education at the University of Leeds