Bates Math — daily algebra, geometry and problem-solving practice from Bates Publishing
Daily math practice
Algebra, geometry and problem solving, taken straight from Bates Publishing textbooks. Ten minutes a day, on a roadmap that remembers where you stopped.
What it is
The textbook, turned into daily practice.
Bates Math takes the algebra, geometry and problem-solving books Bates Publishing already prints and turns them into something you can actually do on a Tuesday night. Units, then lessons, then a handful of problems at a time.
Every problem traces back to a real page in a real book. Nothing here was scraped off a forum, and nothing was invented by a model and shipped without someone reading it first.
Three subjects
Algebra, geometry and problem solving, each with its own roadmap and its own pace.
Sourced from print
Every problem names the book and the chapter it came out of. You can go look it up.
Read by an editor
Nothing reaches a student until a person has checked the problem and its answer.
How it works
Three steps, then it is just a habit.
There is no setup, no course to pick and no syllabus to configure. You answer some questions and the roadmap builds itself.
- 01
Take the placement check
About fifteen minutes, no grade attached. It finds the last thing you are solid on and starts your roadmap there instead of at chapter one.
- 02
Work a few problems a day
Units unlock lessons, lessons hold five to ten problems. Get one wrong and the worked solution comes up before you move on.
- 03
Keep the streak, climb the league
Hitting your daily goal holds the streak. Every Monday you join a cohort of about thirty students, and finishing the week in the top five moves you up.
Three tracks
Pick one, or run all three.
The roadmaps are separate; the streak, the XP and the league are shared across them. Most students keep one main track and dip into the others when a class needs it.
Algebra
Starts at solving for one variable and ends somewhere near rational functions and logs. The longest of the three roadmaps.
- Linear equations
- Quadratics
- Systems
- Exponents and radicals
Geometry
Proof-shaped from the first unit. Diagrams are drawn to scale unless the problem tells you they are not.
- Triangles
- Circles
- Coordinate geometry
- Surface area and volume
Problem Solving
The contest-flavoured track. Fewer procedures, more working out what a question is actually asking for.
- Rates and ratios
- Counting
- Number theory
- Working backwards
Progress
Progress that is actually worth keeping.
None of this makes you better at math on its own. It makes it likelier that you come back tomorrow, and that part does.
Streak
24days
Daily goal
40 / 50 XP
Total XP
12,480
League
Gold
4th of 30
Hearts
4 of 5 hearts remaining
Daily goal
Pick 20, 50 or 100 XP a day. Once you hit it, the app stops asking anything of you until tomorrow.
Streak and freezes
One day at a time. Miss a day and a freeze covers it. You hold two of them and they come back slowly.
XP
Earned per problem, with a bonus for a clean lesson. It is a record of work done, not a currency you can buy.
Hearts
Five a session. A wrong answer costs one. They refill on a timer, or faster if you practise something you already passed.
Weekly leagues
Bronze up to Diamond. Thirty students, one week, top five promote and bottom five drop.
Mastery crowns
Five crown levels per lesson. The problems get harder each time you come back to one you have already cleared.
Problem of the Day
One problem. Everyone. Every day.
Chosen by an editor rather than an algorithm, and set at a level a motivated tenth grader can get with some thinking. It does not cost a heart and it does not care which track you are on.
Answer it and the global solve rate unlocks. Sometimes you get it and so did 80% of the country. Sometimes you get it and almost nobody did, which is the good day.
The length of a rectangle is 3 cm more than twice its width. The perimeter is 42 cm. What is the width?
- A5 cm
- B6 cm
- C8 cm
- D12 cm
Bates Publishing
Built by the publisher, not by a third party.
Bates Math is made by Bates Publishing, a math textbook publisher. The material was already there and already good. What it was missing was a way to do ten minutes of it on a bus.
That is the entire premise. We are not trying to replace the book or the teacher. We are trying to make the practice at the back of each chapter something students actually finish.
Our own content
The problems come from books Bates Publishing wrote, edited and printed. There is no licensed question bank underneath this.
Written for classrooms
The wording, the order and the difficulty curve were built for a school year, then adapted for a phone. Not the other way round.
Traceable to the page
Every problem carries the book and chapter it came from, so a teacher can line the app up with what they are teaching this week.
Start where you actually are.
Take the placement check and see the first week of your roadmap. Fifteen minutes, and you can stop at any point.
Continue with GoogleWorks with a school or a personal Google account.