Junior Certificate Strand 3 - Ordinary Level - Numbers and Shapes Course

Numbers and Shapes is one of the strands of the new Project Maths Course in the Irish curriculum. The concepts of number and number patterns are the basic building blocks of arithmetic and algebra. Furthermore, we cannot escape the use of numbers in our everyday lives. We use clocks and watches to count through the hours and minutes of our day. We count out money to pay our bills and often take a flutter on the lottery by choosing six numbers. The application of Arithmetic and Geometric series in finance is investigated through loan repayments and investments. The use of AER (annual equivalent rate) and APR (annual percentage rate) when calculating repayments is investigated. Students are then introduced to the concept of a complex number and shown how to add, subtract, multiply and divide complex numbers. Complex numbers are used to represent the flow of current in a circuit and are also used in most areas of electronics. We use numbers to measure the perimeter and area of various shapes (triangles, rectangles, hexagons and circles) and we also use numbers to work out the volumes of solids such as cylinders, cones, spheres and hemi-spheres.