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Skiing Maths

Skiing personal bests maths challenge

A child-friendly sports challenge using personal bests to practise subtraction with real examples.

Quick answer

You can use subtraction to find how much your skiing personal best has improved by comparing your old time with your new time.

Learning outcome

By the end of this page, you will be able to find the difference between two skiing times using subtraction, and understand how much faster you are now than before. Success signs:
  • You can subtract two numbers to find the difference
  • You can compare your skiing times and see how much you've improved
  • You can explain how subtraction helps you track your progress
  • You can use a number line or written method to solve subtraction problems

Why this matters

Subtraction is used in many sports to track progress. When you ski, your personal best time is the fastest time you've ever had. By comparing your new time with your old time, you can see how much faster you are now. This helps you know if you're getting better and gives you motivation to keep trying harder. This skill is also useful for other things like measuring how much taller you've grown, how much money you've saved, or how much time you've spent on a task.

How it works

To find how much faster you are in skiing, you subtract your new time from your old time. This shows the difference between them. If your old time was 2 minutes and 30 seconds, and your new time is 2 minutes and 10 seconds, you subtract 2 minutes 10 seconds from 2 minutes 30 seconds. The answer is 20 seconds, which means you got 20 seconds faster! The steps are:
  1. Write down your old skiing time
  2. Write down your new skiing time
  3. Subtract the new time from the old time
  4. Check your answer makes sense

Examples you can see

Let's imagine you're learning to ski and you want to track your progress. Here are some examples: Example 1: Your first time was 4 minutes and 15 seconds. Your second time was 3 minutes and 45 seconds.
  • 4 minutes 15 seconds - 3 minutes 45 seconds = ?
  • First, subtract the seconds: 15 seconds - 45 seconds = -30 seconds
  • Since we can't have negative seconds, we borrow 1 minute (60 seconds) from the minutes
  • So it becomes: 3 minutes 75 seconds - 3 minutes 45 seconds = 30 seconds
Example 2: Your best time was 3 minutes and 20 seconds. Your latest time was 2 minutes and 55 seconds.
  • 3 minutes 20 seconds - 2 minutes 55 seconds = ?
  • Borrow 1 minute (60 seconds): 2 minutes 80 seconds - 2 minutes 55 seconds = 25 seconds
Example 3: Your time was 5 minutes and 10 seconds. Your new time is 4 minutes and 40 seconds.
  • 5 minutes 10 seconds - 4 minutes 40 seconds = ?
  • Borrow 1 minute (60 seconds): 4 minutes 70 seconds - 4 minutes 40 seconds = 30 seconds

Try it as a mini adventure

The Ski Resort Challenge You're on a ski holiday and you've decided to track your skiing progress. You're going to try skiing down three different slopes and time yourself each time. Here's your challenge:
  • First slope: 3 minutes and 25 seconds
  • Second slope: 2 minutes and 50 seconds
  • Third slope: 2 minutes and 15 seconds
Your goal is to find how much faster you got on each slope compared to your previous attempt. Step 1: Compare your first time (3 min 25 sec) with your second time (2 min 50 sec)
  • 3 min 25 sec - 2 min 50 sec = ?
  • Borrow 1 minute (60 seconds): 2 min 85 sec - 2 min 50 sec = 35 seconds
Step 2: Compare your second time (2 min 50 sec) with your third time (2 min 15 sec)
  • 2 min 50 sec - 2 min 15 sec = ?
  • 50 sec - 15 sec = 35 seconds
Step 3: Add up your improvements
  • 35 seconds + 35 seconds = 70 seconds
What you've learned: You've improved by 70 seconds over three runs! That's nearly a minute faster. You're getting better at skiing!

Common mistakes

  • Mistake: Subtracting the smaller time from the bigger time incorrectly
    Why it happens: Children sometimes forget that when comparing times, they need to subtract the newer time from the older time to find the improvement.
    Fix: Always subtract the new time from the old time. If your old time was 3 minutes 30 seconds and your new time is 3 minutes 15 seconds, the difference is 15 seconds faster.
  • Mistake: Forgetting to borrow from minutes when subtracting seconds
    Why it happens: When seconds in the second number are larger than seconds in the first number, children forget they need to borrow from the minutes.
    Fix: When you can't subtract seconds, borrow 1 minute (which is 60 seconds) from the minutes and add it to the seconds.
  • Mistake: Thinking that a bigger number means you're slower
    Why it happens: Children might think that if a time is 4 minutes, they're slower than 3 minutes.
    Fix: Remember, the shorter the time, the faster you are. 3 minutes is faster than 4 minutes.

Parent and carer guide

Helping your child with skiing personal bests subtraction is a great way to make maths real and fun. Here's how you can support them in just 5-10 minutes:
  • Start by asking your child to tell you about their skiing times. If they don't have any, you can make up some examples together
  • Use a stopwatch or timer to practice timing short runs
  • Ask them to explain how they found the difference between two times
  • Encourage them to use drawings or number lines to show their thinking
  • Notice if they're borrowing correctly when subtracting seconds
  • Ask questions like: "What does the difference tell us?" or "Are you getting faster?"
  • Remember to celebrate small improvements - even 5 seconds faster is progress!
  • Don't worry if they make mistakes - that's how we learn!
What to say:
  • "That's a great improvement! How much faster were you?"
  • "Let's draw a number line to help us solve this"