Pandemic or Endemic – the real cause of the maths education crisis?

These uncertain times have seen an unprecedented demand for private maths tuition. On the surface, it seems that this demand is driven by the recent closure of schools, which precipitated a shift to home-schooling, and a collective “discovery” of unstructured lessons online.

However, the explosive growth of the private tutoring market has another, more fundamental cause, which predates the Covid-19 pandemic. There is distrust in the effectiveness of existing school provisions, which has now been exacerbated by doubt around schools’ abilities to mitigate the damage incurred by a pandemic.

The current pandemic did not bring about the problem in maths education. The problem has been building up over a long period of time. According to a study completed this summer by University College London, low attainment in mathematics is a serious and persistent problem that this country is facing. The proportions of the lowest-attaining secondary school students, those who struggle even with the most elementary primary school maths, have doubled since the 1970s. It is estimated that up to 65% of students at the end of Key Stage 3 do not understand some of the most basic mathematical concepts and require urgent pedagogical intervention. The prognosis is that the recent closure of schools will most certainly make this problem worse.

Therefore, it is not surprising that parents are exploring all available means to help their children get an appropriate maths education. Naturally, the most obvious solution is to arrange professionally-delivered lessons at home.

From experience, I know that teaching maths at home is possible, and when done properly, the results can be impressive. At the same time, I do not believe in the effectiveness of ad hoc interventions and cheap online programs.

Maths is a subject which should be taught in a structured manner and learned systematically, but simply having a tutor capable of providing this is not enough. Any type of home schooling requires significant contribution from a parent, although it does not really matter how proficient that parent is. The role of a parent is to organise the child’s time, to make sure that there is no sloppiness in the child’s homework, and that assignments are submitted completely and on time. The involvement of a parent can be gradually withdrawn, as a child gets older. However, a young child is most likely to require a lot of supervision and support.

The pandemic has thrown our endemic problem with maths education into sharp relief, but an integrated approach at home, involving both private tuition and parental involvement, may offer a solution.