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Herbert Thompson Primary School, Cardiff

About the School

Herbert Thompson Primary School is a large school in Wales, serving the Ely area of Cardiff with 466 pupils on roll. Around 51% of children are eligible for free school meals and the school has identified about 45% of pupils as having additional learning needs.

The Challenge

Anna Whitehead, a Senior Teacher at Herbert Thompson said the school is in one of the more deprived areas of Cardiff. Many pupils enter the school’s nursery with levels of skill well below those expected for their age and “develop their numeracy skills robustly as they move through the school.”

Favourite Features of Big Maths

Anna said, “the way Big Maths is organised made such sense. I was constantly faced with children in Year 6 with counting and place value gaps and this programme was just what we needed.

It is incredibly obvious what should be covered in each term, in each year group and Big Maths is all matched to the curriculum which is very reassuring as a Maths leader.”

Beat That!

What Do the Children Think?

“The children are eager to improve and look forward to their weekly challenges. Parental engagement improved with mums, dads, big brothers and sisters coming in and asking us about Big Maths. I even ran workshops for parents on the Big Maths methods so they could support their children. Some of the parents’ own maths skills improved!”

Has Big Maths Saved Teachers’ Time?

“All our staff have been thrilled with how easy it is to print resources and challenges. I like the way all parts of the Big Maths website are linked together, so you can easily see the teaching resources available for each step.”

"We used to spend time marking weekly tests in an excel spreadsheet, so the online challenges do the same job much more effectively. Big Maths is having an impact on learning on learning by giving teacher more time to prepare for their lessons."

The Impact

In their most recent inspection, Estyn considered Herbert Thompson Primary School as excellent in all areas. During the inspection, Anna asked one of the inspectors what he thought of Big Maths. He said, “If all children in Wales had this standard of numeracy skills, we wouldn’t have a problem.”

Talk to Us About Big Maths…

Big Maths is the way forward when it comes to teaching mathematics in your school. Contact us now to arrange a call to discuss how to move forward with the best implementation for you. Take the first step towards changing the way you teach maths. It’s time to rip up the rulebook and teach different.