This was my problem:
"Some ladybird s have 12 spots. They normally have 6 spots on each side of their bodies. How many other ways could you arrange the 12 spots on the ladybird? Can you show me how you did it?"

We used counters to investigate different ways of putting spots on the ladybird's body. We recorded what we found out in a table and using the computer.

We found out that there are 13 different ways of putting 12 spots on the ladybird. We looked for and explained patterns that we found.