● For teachers and coordinators
Maths practice tools for primary classrooms, compared
If your school runs the IB Primary Years Programme (PYP) and you want practice that follows its four maths phases, the honest answer on 26 September 2026 is: almost nothing does, directly. Here are seven products, Explorisle among them, on the same seven questions, with the page each fact came from.
Ameera Surekha, who built Explorisle at home for one child · 26 September 2026
How to read this
Every cell comes from the product's own site, fetched on 26 September 2026. Prices are copied as displayed, in the currency the site showed; they change, and two pages of one site showed two family prices the same day. Nothing here repeats a product's claims about results; every site makes them, none of them is checked here, and this page makes none for Explorisle either. If a cell is wrong, tell me and I will fix it the same week.
The seven, side by side
| Product | Ages | Child account | Free part | Price as shown, 26 September 2026 | Adverts | Mapped to the phases? |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Explorisle (Numberground) | 5 to 12 | No account; a seven-character player tag | All of it, for good | Nothing is sold | None, ever | Levels follow the four phases by my own reading of the document (see the scope-and-sequence page); not endorsed by the IB |
| Matific | K to grade 9 (site says ages 4 to 15) | Yes, registered by a parent, teacher or school | 7-day trial | Parents: US$79.00 a year or US$19.99 a month; schools by demo | Site states no advertising; kidSAFE listed | Its scope-and-sequence pages for the programme did not load on 26 September 2026; not verified either way |
| Mathletics (3P Learning) | 5 to 16 | Yes, student sign-in | 30-day trial | Schools by quote; home price not shown | States no marketing to children | Not listed. The sister product Mathseeds (ages 3 to 9) publishes a correlation to phases 1 to 3, dated March 2020 |
| Prodigy Math | Grades 1 to 8 | Yes | The maths questions are free; teachers free | Parent memberships from US$9.95 a month, sold inside the app; annual shown under a discount banner | States no ad targeting of students | No. Named standards are US, Canadian and Australian |
| Khan Academy Kids | 2 to 8 | Child profile, nickname recommended | All of it; states no ads, no subscriptions | None | States no ads | No. US early-learning frameworks. Its range stops at 8 |
| Times Tables Rock Stars | 6 and up | Yes, one login per child, set up by an adult | School trial (length not shown) | Schools £116.80 a year excl. VAT; families £9 a year (one page showed £7.20 the same day) | States no ads, no in-app purchases | No curriculum named. Tables and division only |
| IXL | Pre-K to calculus | Yes; under-13 accounts made by an adult | 10 questions when not signed in | Families from €9.95 a month (shown in EUR to a Dutch visitor); schools not shown | Not stated | Partly. Skill plans follow Oxford University Press's textbook series for the programme, with a disclaimer; not the IB document itself |
What the mapping column means
The programme's mathematics scope and sequence describes four phases across five strands. A product is "mapped" if its own pages say which of its activities sit in which phase. On the day of checking: Matific's pages for that mapping did not load, so it is recorded as not verified rather than absent; Mathletics names many national curricula and no IB programme, while its early-years sibling Mathseeds publishes a 2020 correlation for phases 1 to 3; IXL maps to Oxford University Press's textbook series written for the programme, one step removed from the IB document and with a disclaimer; Prodigy, Khan Academy Kids and Times Tables Rock Stars name no IB mapping at all.
Explorisle's levels follow the phases by my own reading of the document, set out on the scope-and-sequence page. That is a mapping I made, not one the IB checked.
Fair things to say about each
- Matific: a large activity library from kindergarten to grade 9, a parent plan priced in US dollars, no advertising stated. The programme pages were unreachable on the day.
- Mathletics: a school programme for ages 5 to 16 with many national curricula named; school pricing by quote.
- Prodigy: the maths questions are free for teachers and children; the paid part is a parent membership sold inside the app, in US dollars.
- Khan Academy Kids: free, no adverts, ages 2 to 8, built to US frameworks; it stops before the upper primary years.
- Times Tables Rock Stars: tables and division only, a published school price in pounds, no adverts or in-app purchases stated.
- IXL: paid practice across subjects, with skill plans for the Oxford series and for the IB's middle and diploma years; family prices in local currency.
- Explorisle: free, no account, no adverts, nothing sold; maths, words, science and more on one map; class codes and an evidence sheet for the units; open source. Tested so far by a handful of children, not by a study.
What none of them will do
Replace the teacher. The programme's units need a classroom conversation, and a practice tool of any kind is the five minutes that keeps the facts quick so the conversation can happen. Pick the one whose data rules you can explain to a parent in one sentence.
On the island
Not on the island yet: a school view across several classes, and an export to a planner. Both are on the list.
Read next
Explorisle is an independent product of A Surekha (the registered business of Ameera Surekha). It is not endorsed by, affiliated with or licensed by the International Baccalaureate Organization. IB, PYP and International Baccalaureate are registered trademarks of the IBO.