Jenny Field, Professor of Mathematics Education in the School of Education, has received national interest in her year-long research focused CPD programme, designed to support school leaders with the introduction of the new MTC in summer 2020.
Over the past 3 years there has been significant reach, with mathematics co-ordinators introducing 'Whole School Approaches to Teaching, Learning and Understanding Times Tables' to over 40,000 children across 5 local authorities, and on-going research demonstrates clear impact. This work is funded by the National Maths Hubs. In 2019 United Learning, the largest Teaching Alliance in the UK, requested training in this programme to roll out to their own schools from Kent to Cumbria.The NCETM, the government funded body charged with improving the teaching of mathematics nationally, has recognised the significance of Jenny's work, recommended the programme and published her related articles on its website.
Jenny said: With the introduction of new statutory testing, I was keen to ensure that schools had access to high quality CPD. I have always recognised the importance of children having recall of their multiplication fact, however I believe that memorization without understanding is of very little value. What is needed is automaticity, whereby facts are recalled, but with prior depth of understanding. This was uppermost in my mind when I designed this innovation project.
