Answer extracted from the Education: Joining the Dots podcast — listen to the full episode below.
What does research suggest are the key areas for developing effective mathematics practice in secondary schools?
The Education Endowment Foundation study released in June identified four priority areas for mathematics practice: teacher skills and expertise, targeted interventions using assessment data and personalized materials, impactful practice where data reflects positive outcomes, and program engagement through adaptive testing that removes barriers to participation. These areas form the foundation for schools aiming to strengthen mathematics outcomes.
Building on Teacher Expertise and Data-Driven Support
The first two areas—strengthening teacher skills and deploying targeted interventions powered by assessment data—work in tandem. Teachers need both confidence and tools to deliver effective mathematics instruction. The framework emphasizes using assessment insights to match personalized practice materials, such as those available through platforms like Freckle, directly to individual learner needs rather than applying one-size-fits-all solutions.
As Andy Small explains in the episode, this data-informed approach ensures that interventions reach the students who need them most, at precisely the right level of difficulty.
Making Practice Count and Removing Test Barriers
The third and fourth priorities—impactful practice and program engagement—address how students interact with mathematics learning itself. Impactful practice means classroom activity that genuinely translates to measurable progress, not just busy work. Program engagement removes friction points that discourage students from fully participating, particularly through adaptive testing approaches that adjust difficulty in real time.
A deeper discussion of how these design principles were applied to create an effective assessment experience is covered in this podcast episode, which explores how adaptive technology reduces the anxiety many students feel during mathematics testing.
"We tried to ensure that a test experience is one that ensures challenge for those kids that demand it, as well as scaffolding for those that might find maths more difficult."
Andy Small — Assessment Specialist for Numeracy and Mathematics at Renaissance (GL Assessment). With nearly 16 years of classroom experience as a mathematics specialist in primary and independent prep schools, where he led mathematics for most of his career, Small brings direct understanding of both teacher challenges and student learning needs. He now works on assessment product development, applying his frontline expertise to create tools that support individual learners and their teachers.
The episode also reveals concrete examples of how schools like Cardinal Heenan and Cornerstone Academy Trust have benefited from this integrated approach, moving beyond surface-level intervention to systemic improvement. Listening to the full conversation provides insight into how these four research pillars translate into practical day-to-day classroom strategies.
Key takeaways
- Teacher skills and expertise form the foundation—without confident, well-trained mathematics educators, other interventions cannot succeed.
- Targeted interventions must be informed by real assessment data and paired with personalized practice materials tailored to individual students.
- Practice activities need to demonstrably improve outcomes; assessment data should validate that classroom work translates to measurable progress.
- Adaptive testing and personalized assessment experiences increase student engagement by removing one-size-fits-all barriers and anxiety.
See also
How can adaptive mathematics assessment reduce anxiety and improve accuracy for student testing?
Adaptive assessments remove the one-size-fits-all approach where everybody sits the same questions in the same order. The New Group Math Test's adaptive algorithm presents tailored questions based on individual performance, reducing test anxiety and improving assessment accuracy.
What design principles guided the development of the New Group Math Test?
Two key drivers shaped NGMT design: first, ensuring a personalized and stress-free test experience for every individual learner; second, putting the most appropriate content in front of each child to deliver both challenge and scaffolding.
How does persistent student absence impact GCSE mathematics attainment rates?
According to statistics cited in the episode, approximately 84% of students who were rarely absent in years 10 and 11 secured a GCSE pass at grade four or above. When student absence reached 10% of sessions, fewer than 50% achieved grade 4 or above.