Improve Maths Blog

What do headteachers need to know about the maths GCSE?

I have been given the chance to lead professional development sessions for a secondary heads’ association and so this question has been exercising my mind for a few weeks. I am pondering the possibility that there will be some schools that have made only small adjustments to maths content in their schemes. It seems to […]

Progression in Addition and subtraction (mental skills)

Build confidence – plan a programme for GCSE practice papers

Every maths department uses past/practice papers in Y11. Without a careful plan, it can be dull and demoralising for all concerned! Students tell us they feel like failures because full papers are too hard. Teachers tell us it’s hard to ‘get round’ all the students and to maintain interest when they ‘go through’ the questions. […]

Mental Maths in Key Stage 1

We have developed some simple support to improve maths progression in KS1 mental skills and here are our top ten tips to bear in mind when planning for mental maths: Mental maths is at the heart of the KS1 curriculum Every day must provide lots of opportunities for mental maths From time to time, explicitly […]

Our support for tier of entry decisions at GCSE

We used a survey to gather data and feed back to participants  We had a great response to our tier of entry survey which meant we could summarise a good-sized set of data and feedback the overall picture to contributors at the end of April. This helped the contributing schools to see if their choices […]