Year 8
The Collatz conjecture
Switch to our new maths teaching resources
Slide decks, worksheets, quizzes and lesson planning guidance designed for your classroom.
Play new resources video
Lesson details
Key learning points
- In this lesson, we will learn about a famous unsolved maths problem called The Collatz conjecture.
Licence
This content is made available by Oak National Academy Limited and its partners and licensed under Oak’s terms & conditions (Collection 1), except where otherwise stated.
Loading...
5 Questions
Q1.
Fill the gap: Every even integer greater than two can be written as the sum of two __________ integers.
perfect
small
troublesome
Q2.
Goldbach wrote his conjecture in a letter. Who was the letter to?
His parent
His wife
Lohar Collatz
Q3.
What was Mr Golbach's first name?
Antoni
Lohar
Xavier
Q4.
True or false: Goldbach's conjecture is proven to be true.
True
Q5.
Write 7 as a sum of two prime numbers.
2 + 2 + 3
4 + 3
6 + 1
6 Questions
A sequence is defined as follows: Start with any positive integer value (𝑛). Each term is found from the previous term as follows: If the value is even, divide it by 2 (𝑛/2). If the value is odd, multiply it by 3 and add 1 (3𝑛+1).
Q2.
If the first term of the sequence is 30, what would the second term be?
100
60
91
Q3.
If the second term of the sequence is 30, what would could the first term be?
100
15
91
Q4.
Fill in the gap: The Collatz conjecture states: no matter the start number (𝑛), the sequence will always reach __________.
half of the start number
infinity
zero
Q5.
What is the first name of Mr Collatz?
Bob
Christian
Leonard
Q6.
In what year did Collatz make his conjecture?
1927
1997
2007