FAQ

MathsMakers works with schools to help students reach their full potential in maths. We offer small group maths tuition sessions, either in person in school or online from home. See ‘Working with Schools’ for more information.

Our maths intervention groups are very small to allow for lots of individual support. Generally our online groups consist of no more that 4 students and our in-person groups contain no more than 10 students, but are sometimes smaller than this depending on whether we have support from Y12 mentors.

Currently most of our schools are in North London and this is where we can offer in-school tuition. If you are interested in an online intervention programme we are able to offer this to schools based anywhere in England.

Yes, we have a Quality Mark accreditation from the National Resource Centre for Supplementary Education (NRCSE) which was renewed in 2024. We also have accreditation from the National Tutoring Programme (NTP), which was received in August 2024.

We can tutor any students from Y6 to 11, however we do have a focus on disadvantaged students (pupil premium, EAL and SEND).

We take a rounded approach to progress tracking, adopting a number of different methods including: Observations during the tutorials Level of completion of work Engagement/confidence Homework completion End of topic quiz results compared to start of topic quiz results End of programme feedback from students, parents and schools. Schools are kept up to date with progress on a regular basis.

In our maths intervention programmes where we test students' knowledge at the start/end of topic blocks, we generally see a 20 percentage point increase in their test scores. At the end of each programme we ask students for feedback. In 2023/24 94% of students reported making progress in their maths after attending one of our programmes and lots reported an increase in confidence around maths.

We have a strong team of highly qualified, experienced maths teachers and tutors. More information can be found here.

Schools have real time access to our shared drive where you will be able to see student attendance. We also provide regular feedback throughout an intervention programme, either via email or on our shared drive if preferred. At the end of the school year the school will receive a programme report covering full details of all of the programmes that were run during the year. This will include student progress and future recommendations. We encourage schools to provide us with parent contact details so that we can also regularly communicate with parents. Where we have these details, parents will receive weekly reminders of their child's session. They may also receive some progress updates throughout the programme and a student report at the end of the programme.

Before we run a new maths programme we normally hold a parent/carer information session where you will be told more about us and how the programme works. We can also provide a copy of our Information session slides on request, however we would prefer you to attend the meeting wherever possible so that you have an opportunity to meet us and ask questions. If you want more information on your child’s progress during a programme, please contact us and we will be happy to provide this.

Students will require a device to enable them to take part in our online sessions. As the instructor will often be presenting information and methods using slides, we would prefer student’s to log in using a computer or laptop. Although they will be able to access the session using a mobile phone, it will be very hard to view some of the maths content and we would discourage this method wherever possible. ​ Students should also have to hand some paper and a pen/pencil for taking notes and doing maths calculations. For our older students (Y10/11) we would also ask them to have a calculator to hand. ​ We also ask students to ensure their device is charged sufficiently before logging in or to make sure they have the charger with them.

Before each session we will send you a reminder with the login details. These details will remain the same each week so please make sure your child has a copy saved to their device. ​ Most of our sessions take place over zoom. The link provided should take your child straight to the tutorial session, where they will be placed in a waiting room until the Instructor admits them. ​ If the link doesn’t work for you, please try logging in with the Meeting ID and passcode provided in our reminder message. To do this go to https://zoom.us/ and click the ‘Join’ link at the top right of the page. ​ If this still doesn’t work please try the following: ​ Double check they are using the correct link. The link for our initial Information Session meeting is different to the tutorial link so make sure they are using the tutorial one. Restart the device and try again. If you are using the zoom app, check you are using the latest version If you have done all of the above and you are still having issues, please let us know and we will try to help.

All of our tutorial groups are carefully assigned by the school and MathsMakers to best meet the needs of the student. Students are placed with peers of a similar level to ensure they get the most out of the sessions as possible. Occasionally we may move a student after the programme starts if we feel they would be better placed in another group. ​ If your child is unable to attend their allocated day/time for a specific reason please contact MathsMakers in the first instance to let us know. We may be able to accommodate some changes, however this very much depends on the programme and cannot be guaranteed.

Your child’s school has requested online tutoring and as such this is all we can offer at this time. Please do speak to the school if you feel in-person sessions would be beneficial as this can be considered for future programmes if the school agrees.

Please let us know as soon as possible, in advance of the session. This is especially important for our online intervention programmes, so that we can make the Instructor aware of who to expect before the session starts.

Unfortunately due to safeguarding reasons this is not possible, however your child will have access to a shared student drive where they will be able to access the session slides.

We normally set a short piece of homework each week which we ask students to bring to the next session. The homework is always based on the maths topic covered in the session and is used to help embed the information covered. ​ We understand that students can receive a lot of homework from school, so we try to keep ours short, but we do encourage students to complete it as it really does help with progress.

Our maths programmes are aimed at schools, rather than private tutoring.

Students in our in-person programmes can benefit from the extra support of student mentors. These are year 12 maths students who volunteer their time to help younger students. Each tutorial is still led by our qualified instructor but mentors are trained to support students throughout the session at a 1-on-1 or 1-on-2 level. More information about our mentor support can be found here.

Mentors are fully trained and work alongside our instructor to provide invaluable support to students. In return they gain what we believe to be one of the best-supported, most accessible and rewarding work experiences available to year 12s. Mentors are fully trained in advance by our staff and can use their volunteering towards Duke of Edinburgh awards and to strengthen UCAS and job applications.

We do have some experienced maths volunteers that help in our in-person sessions. Please contact us to discuss our current volunteering opportunities.