2023-2024 was the final year of the Parental Engagement Programme and we are very grateful to all the schools who have taken part, and the organisations who have made it possible by generously funding this important initiative: Capital One, Vanquis Banking Group, CISI Future Foundation and the Garfield Weston Foundation.
Why is parental engagement important?
Parents, carers and families give children their first experiences of maths – and research shows that, in primary schools, family influences have a bigger impact than school on children’s attainment. There’s also evidence that children are more motivated to learn about maths when parents talk with them about numeracy in everyday life.
Hence, it’s vital to support parents to engage with their children around maths – and this is what the Parental Engagement Programme aimed to do. We strived to improve parents’ confidence in supporting their children, thereby improving children’s own confidence, and to promote a maths-positive environment both at home and at school.
How did we do it?
At National Numeracy, we especially focus on supporting people with low confidence or skills with numbers in disadvantaged communities, where the need is greatest, so all participating schools were in identified "areas of need".
As part of the programme this year, each school received:
- In-person training for project lead teachers, senior leadership team members and parental ambassadors on parental engagement strategies and how best to use National Numeracy’s Family Maths Toolkit activities
- Numeracy Champion training for project leads
- A template action plan
- Family Maths Toolkit activities and scrapbooks for all children taking part
- Termly cluster meeting, giving project lead teachers the chance to share ideas, learning and best practice, and to access further support form National Numeracy
- A one-to-one support phone call with National Numeracy’s parental engagement expert
- Ongoing remote support
- A ‘Help Your Child Love Maths!’ parent workshop about supporting children to develop positive attitudes towards maths
- Access to the National Numeracy Challenge for parents and carers
- Template communication materials about the project, the workshop, and the National Numeracy Challenge for schools to share with parents and carers.
What were the results?
We delivered ‘Help Your Child Love Maths!’ parent workshops to each school, reaching over 550 parents and carers in total. And 92% of those who attended told us that they felt more able to support their child with maths as a result of the session and 88% felt more confident about maths themselves!
77% of parents/carers of participating children engaged with their child using the Family Maths Toolkit activities, and in Bolton and Nottingham this rose to 91%.
Positive changes were seen in children’s confidence with maths and participation in class maths activities, and the extent to which parents/carers supported their child’s learning and engaged in conversations about maths. Teachers told us that children are "more confident to apply their learning outside of maths lessons," and "are noticing when they are coming across maths in real life and bringing these examples into school."
We also got great feedback from the children themselves, talking about the activities:
- "It helps me with my maths and it is fun to do with my family."
- "I like using things from home to help me with numbers."
- "They are challenging and they help me to practise."
And parents, with such comments as:
- "My child is more open to me on any issues relating to maths unlike in the past."
- "Having the opportunity to complete maths activities as a family has helped with my son’s confidence."
- "The scrapbook has improved my child’s confidence as it’s a fun way of getting involved in maths."
We’re thrilled with the results of the programme this year and we’re excited that we have expanded the project into our new Schools & Families Programme, putting positive number attitudes at the heart of school communities, boosting confidence among pupils, staff and parents/carers.
