From dividing up cakes to reading timetables, this series shows how maths problem solving is needed in everyday life

Anita Loughrey was a primary school teacher for seventeen years before becoming a full-time writer. She writes teacher resources, educational fiction and non-fiction on a wide variety of subjects for a wide range of publishers with over 85 books published in the UK and many more worldwide. She writes for the national writing magazine Writers' Forum and teaches creative writing.
Anita's favourite toy as a child was the typewriter she wrote her autobiography with at the age of ten. As nothing exciting ever happened, she made most of it up. Her interests include writing, reading children's books, knitting, jive dancing and camping with her family in their VW campervan. She reckons there is nothing better than sleeping under the stars and cooking in the great outdoors, as long as it isn't raining.

• 1: How many hours are there in a year on Earth?
• 2: How do you write these number words as numerals?
• 3: How many minutes does sunlight take to travel to Earth?
• 4: What are the countdown sequences?
• 5: How many weeks are there in a month?
• 6: How many constellation sightings were there?
• 7: What's the best to-scale diameter for Mars?
• 8: How much food did astronauts take to the ISS?
• 9: How many times does the ISS orbit Earth every day?
• 10: How long did it take Apollo 16 to get to the Moon?
• 11: What shapes can you see in the spaceship?
• 12: What are the new coordinates for the rocket?
• 13: Which planet has the shortest day?
• 14: Glossary
• 15: Answers