Welcome to the SUMS project resource portal. From this site, you can access a wide range of online resources that provide support for students with numeracy problems.

The SUMS project (Students Upgrading Maths Skills) is designed to address numeracy issues amongst students in further- and higher-education. Alongside the research elements of the project, we are building this online portal that will allow both students and tutors to find suitable online resources to address numeracy issues. The main 'Finder' page provides access to a database of several hundred links to online resources that range from general study skills to academic sites. If you are looking for a resource, you should be able to find what you are looking for!

How the Finder works

Following research and consultation, we have grouped numeracy issues into a series of topics:

• Basic numerical operations
• Ratios, fractions, dilutions, decimals and percentages
• Measurements, scales and negative numbers
• Effective estimation
• Accuracy and precision, significant figures
• Powers and logarithms
• Data, variables and parameters
• Algebra, expressions, formulae and equations
• Plotting and interpreting graphs and charts
• Shape and size
• Basic trigonometry
• Use of spreadsheets.(e.g. Excel)

You can search for resources within a single topic at a time. You can refine your search in three ways:

• Resource type – is it an interactive object such as an animated activity; a web page with navigation and different media, or a printable document?
• Access type – can you ‘deep link’ to within one click of the learning activity; or can you only use the site navigation; or is the site subscription only?
• Level – is the activity ‘basic’, ‘intermediate’ or ‘advanced’?

The search will return a list of resource links that satisfy your query. For a single object in the database, ‘Resource type’ and ‘Access type’ can only be one value, although you can search for more than one type. In the case of ‘Level’, a single object may have been classified as being suitable for more than one level.

Clicking on a resource link will open a results page for that resource object, which provides further information including a brief description and any user comments. The URL of the resource object (or as close as you can get to it) provides a live link, that opens in a new window or tab in your browser. When you have viewed the object, you can return to the results page to leave a comment of your own.

The SUMS project

SUMS is hosted at Anglia Ruskin University and is funded by The Higher Education EvidenceNet programme and by Anglia Ruskin. The project combines research into numeracy issues in FE and HE with the assessment, design and publication of suitable online resources. This site is the major outcome of that part of the project.