Making mathematical understanding visible
In maths, we know having the correct answer doesn’t always equal secure understanding. If we want to find out what pupils really know, we need to look beyond what’s written down. “But I know the…
What “the edge” really means
In our last blog, we made the case for why maths needs a clearer story and introduced an idea from our research with 600+ young mathematicians: maths gives you the edge. We unpacked the intrinsic…
Why maths needs a clear story
There’s a noisy debate happening right now: will AI make maths irrelevant, or more valuable than ever? We believe we should be focusing on why maths is valuable because of what it does for young…
Our research: The Year 7 moment
The transition from primary to secondary school can make or break a pupil’s attitudes towards maths and school. Pupils arrive in Year 7 full of optimism. Within months, for many high-attaining pupils, that optimism fades.…
Problem solving isn’t magic
“The important thing about a problem is not its solution, but the strength we gain in finding the solution.” – Seneca Sweets come in packets of 12, 15 or 20. How many packets did you…
Why ‘fun’ isn’t just for the last week of term
December can be a tough month in the teaching world. The days are cold and dark, end of term assessments loom and both pupils and teachers are ready for a well-earned break after the longest…
What our Data & Impact Interns learned this summer
Axiom Maths welcomed two brilliant Data and Impact interns this summer. Sharon and Billy joined to help with several projects, including an impact evaluation of two year’s worth of data to shape our future strategy.…
England’s missing mathematicians
This post first appeared in TES magazine here. It is reproduced with their permission. New research from UCL shows only 9% of disadvantaged pupils with strong maths scores at the end of primary school score go…
The Year 7 school switch-off by spring
We previously studied the drop-off in pupil attitudes toward school between the end of Year 6 and the end of Year 7. Now we’re looking in more detail at when this occurs during the transition.…
Maths Pathway: How do girls progress through the system?
Like all maths teachers, we’ve wondered about why more girls don’t choose to study maths. So we looked at the data and found that much of our prior understanding was wrong. There’s not an issue…
The disadvantage gap in Year 6 pupils’ experience of maths
Last year we surveyed two thousand pupils in Years 6 to 9 to find out more about their experience of maths in Key Stage 3. We found attitudes to maths got worse between Year 6…
Maths education in England: Attainment and attitudes
Axiom Maths have published our first report on the state of maths education in England. The report pulls together a comprehensive set of attainment data to paint an holistic picture of performance, and adds detailed…