20 questions with no calculator: the four operations, fractions, percentages, order of operations, factors and estimation.
✏️ Paper 1 non-calculator warm-up — Foundation
Paper 1 is worth exactly as much as each calculator paper, and it is the one most Foundation students practise least. This sheet is a warm-up for it: twenty questions drawn from the number and ratio statements that turn up on the non-calculator paper year after year — column arithmetic with decimals and negatives, adding and subtracting fractions, percentages of amounts, priority of operations, factors and multiples, and estimating by rounding to one significant figure. Do it with a pen and nothing else. Twenty-five minutes is about right, but do not stop early if you need longer; the point is to find out which of these have quietly gone rusty, not to score well. Mark it, then go back to the topic page for whichever one cost you the most.
- 1.Write 0.325 as a fraction in its simplest form.
- 2.A number is multiplied by 4, then 8 is added, giving the result 40. Work out the number.
- 3.Write the ratio 8 : 15 in the form 1 : n.
- 4.A charity collects donations from adults and children in the ratio 5:2. Altogether, £238 is collected. Work out how much more the adults donate than the children.
- 5.A spreadsheet shows that 812 − 397 = 315. Work out an estimate for 812 − 397, by rounding each number to the nearest 100, to check whether the spreadsheet's answer is reasonable.
- 6.Simplify the ratio 45 : 30 : 75 to its simplest form.
- 7.Estimate the value of √45, giving your answer to the nearest whole number.
- 8.Divide 84 in the ratio 3:4. Work out the smaller share.
- 9.Write 75p : £1.50 as a ratio of whole numbers in its simplest form.
- 10.A bag contains 7 red counters and 15 blue counters. Write down the ratio of red counters to blue counters in its simplest form.
- 11.A fruit bowl contains 9 apples and 21 oranges. Write down the ratio of apples to oranges in its simplest form.
- 12.Which of these ratios is equivalent to 6 : 10 : 14?
- 13.Which statement about the number 91 is correct?
- 14.40% of a number is 12 more than 25% of the same number. Work out the number.
- 15.Two lighthouses flash at the start of the same minute. The first lighthouse flashes every 8 minutes and the second flashes every 12 minutes. Work out how many minutes it will be until they next flash together.
- 16.A charity raffle sells 240 tickets at £1.85 each. 40% of the money raised is given to a local hospital. Work out how much money the hospital receives.
- 17.The number 24 can be written as 2³ × 3, and the number 60 can be written as 2² × 3 × 5. Work out the lowest common multiple of 24 and 60.
- 18.A charity bake sale sells 187 cakes at £2.95 each. By rounding each number to 1 significant figure, work out an estimate for the total amount raised.
- 19.A box holds 140 pens. 25% of the pens are red. Work out how many of the pens are red.
- 20.A recipe uses flour, sugar and butter in the ratio 8 : 3 : 5. Write the ratio of flour to the rest of the mixture (sugar and butter combined) in its simplest form.
What is on this worksheet?
The sheet holds 20 questions drawn from the MathsUK bank — the content areas covered: Number, Ratio, proportion and rates of change (statements N2, N3, N4, N10, N12, N14, R4, R5, R9). It is pitched at GCSE Foundation and takes about 25 minutes to work through in full. It is built for independent practice, with full answers at the end for self-marking.
How to use the sheet well
- Print it or open it on screen — both work. Printing is A4; the screen view fits phones and tablets.
- Do all 20 questions before checking — about 25 minutes is the guide, but there is no time pressure.
- Check the answers — press “Show answers” or print the answer page separately.
- Redo the questions you got wrong — twice as effective as doing 20 fresh ones.
- “New questions” — builds a fresh sheet on the same statements, so you can practise again without repeats.
Why this sheet helps
MathsUK worksheets use questions graded by difficulty and a fair spread of correct-answer positions (the answer is not always (a)) — so the student really has to think about each question rather than guess a pattern. Every question is tagged to a DfE content statement and checked before it enters the bank. The answers come with a step-by-step explanation, not just a value — so a wrong answer becomes a lesson.
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