Maths at home: what your child is working on, and how to help

The words the school uses

Many international primary schools run the IB Primary Years Programme (PYP). Its maths is described in strands (number; pattern and function; measurement; shape and space; data handling) and phases (four stages of understanding, which a child moves through at their own pace, not by birthday). A unit of inquiry is a few weeks on one big question, such as how markets work or why people move, with maths, science and language inside it rather than in separate boxes.

None of that changes what a seven-year-old needs at home: to know their number facts well enough to think with them, and to see maths do a job.

Five minutes, most days

• One sum at dinner. Not ten. One, the one the child got wrong yesterday. The parent view on Explorisle tells you which.
• Count the change. Shops, buses, the coins in a jar. Real money is the best number line there is.
• Read the clock. How long until we leave? How long did that take? An analogue clock in the kitchen does a year of work on its own.
• Measure something. The cake tin, the dog, the doorway. Estimate first, then check.
• Ask what they found out. Every unit has a big question. Ask it at the table and listen.

What not to do

No timed tests at the table. Speed comes from knowing, not from pressure, and pressure makes a child who is already unsure stop trying. No sticker charts for maths; the point is that the sum came out right, and that is its own reward. And do not worry about the phase. A child in phase 2 at eight is not behind; phases are stages, not ages.

What the parent view shows

Tap For parents on the first screen of Explorisle. It shows what your child is working on this week, the weakest five facts, the one sum to ask at dinner, and how many facts are quick now against day one. If a class unit is set, it shows the big idea and three things to ask about it.

Nothing is scored against another child. There is no account, no email for the child, no adverts and nothing to buy. Progress lives under a seven-character player tag, like a game console; the tag holds no name.

Ten minutes on the island

Your child types a first name or nothing at all, picks a hero and walks. Every rock, tree and egg asks a sum at their level. A wrong answer shows a way to see it and comes back later. At about five minutes the island asks if it is a good spot to stop, and the child decides. Phone, tablet or laptop, in the browser, nothing to install.