When the students in Mrs Cresswell’s Maths class asked when they’d ever use geometry, she had the answer, as follows:

Year 10 were completing their unit of construction of triangles. We had just drawn an isosceles triangle when one pupil asked when they were ever going to need to draw an isosceles triangle in real life.

I said every Christmas when you make gingerbread houses with your kids. The class sounded excited to try as many had not had the ‘gingerbread experience’.

In pairs I gave them the dimensions of the tray and they had to construct their own template. This was the hardest bit as a few had a number of trial runs before getting it.

Four Year 10’s stayed after school and made the gingerbread and cut out all the pieces. The gingerbread was given back to the class and they spent a wonderful lesson decorating. Some amazing bits of imagination and design. Hopefully they will never forget how to construct a triangle.