Comic Relief Maths Activities To Give Maths A Red Nose in 2024

With Red Nose Day 2024 just around the corner, here are some Comic Relief maths activities to help you join in with the fun, even during maths lessons.

Red Nose Day 2024 is on Friday 15th March. It is a day ‘when people across the land get together, put on their Noses, and change lives’. And in schools, this means it’s a day dedicated to making the act of giving fun and helping those in need.

For more information on how to get involved, see Comic Relief’s school pages.

Maths, charity and giving

Being conscientious, charitable, and kind is – surely – what we hope our pupils will be throughout their lives. However, it is important to remember that sometimes this doesn’t come naturally. As primary school teachers, you might say it is our duty to try and instil and nurture positive attributes and qualities in our pupils across year groups. Bringing charity work into your maths activities and teaching resources is one way to do this.

Plus, whenever you’re giving money, there’s always an element of mathematics. So whilst Red Nose Day maths activities contribute to creating more well-rounded and empathetic pupils, they can also hone their maths skills.

Plus, whenever you’re giving money, there’s always an element of mathematics. So whilst Red Nose Day maths activities contribute to creating more well-rounded and empathetic pupils, they can also hone their numeracy skills.

With this in mind, below are two maths activities linked to Red Nose Day 2024 for you to try out in the classroom. You can also adapt them to be suitable for the key stage you are teaching. For the printable Red Nose Day activity worksheets, maths resources and more Spring Term activities linked to topical maths, download your free topical problem solving resource.

Comic Relief Maths Activity 1: Red Nose Day Roundup

Since 1988, Comic Relief has raised over £1 billion pounds! Assuming the amount raised by Red Nose Day over 15 Red Nose Days was £900 million, let’s use these figures to solve the maths problems below.

• If each Red Nose Day had raised the same amount, how much would that be?
• If 75 countries had benefited from the money raised, how much did each one receive, on average?
• If ⅖ of the total amount raised had gone to the UK, how much money had the UK received?
• In 2013, Red Nose Day raised £100,331,808. How much more money was raised in the other 14 Red Nose Days?
• The first Red Nose Day raised £15,000,000. What fraction of the total amount raised is this?

Answers

1. £900m ÷ 15 = £6m
2. £900m ÷ 75 = £1.2mil per country on average
3. £900m ÷ 5 = £180m (one fifth) £180m × 2 = £360m (two fifths)
4. £900m − £100,331,808 = £799,668,192.00 raised in 14 other RNDs
5. 1/60 (15/900 expressed as fraction in simplest form)

Comic Relief Maths Activity 2: Red Nose Day Danceathon

Comic Relief spends the money raised by Red Nose Day to help people living tough lives across the UK and Africa. In 2015, Dermot O’Leary raised £1 million for Red Nose Day by dancing for 24 hours.

• How much did he raise every hour, to the nearest £?
• How much did he raise every minute?
• How much did he raise every second, to the nearest penny?

Answers

1. £1,000,000 ÷ 24 = £41,667
2. £41,667 ÷ 60 = £694.45 (or £694.44 if exact answer from Q1 is used, rather than the rounded one)
3. £694.45 ÷ 60 = £11.57

Tweet us at @thirdspacetweet and tell us: what did your school do this Red Nose Day?

Great calculating work for #RedNoseDay thanks for the problems, @thirdspacetweet ! pic.twitter.com/NoHQZPw3db

— Bede Primary School (@BedePrimSchool) March 24, 2017

Third Space Learning’s online maths tuition sessions include topics on money, helping to familiarise students with the real world applications of maths.

Check out 20+ more fun topical KS2 maths investigations in our blog: KS2 Maths Problem Solving Investigations Based On Real Life.