Education Today Article
When a school for children with learning difficulties starts getting significant passes at GCSE, it’s time to take note of its methods.
Selly Oak School in Birmingham is a special school that caters for children with moderate learning difficulties.
As such, it is not a place where you would expect to find many young people for whom the world of GCSE maths would hold the slightest relevance.
And yet, not only are more and more of these students taking GCSE maths, they are doing so after attending mixed ability classes for their entire secondary schooling.
They are also getting some really interesting grades even though these students were unable to participate in the year 7 SATS. This summer two students gained grade Bs, 3 gained Cs, 4 gained Ds, 1 gained an E and 1 an F.
Head Teacher, Mr Graham Ridley and students of Selly Oak School
At this point a further question arises – how has one special school managed to teach this group of mixed ability students, all with special needs, and get them these grades where all earlier predictions suggested there would be no point in even attempting the exam?
The revolutionary approach that was adopted by Roz Horton, Head of Maths at Selly Oak School, was to introduce the on-line maths teaching program, ConquerMaths. “Some of these young people had reading ages as young as 8 but were still able to get a grade C at maths because of the unique approach of ConquerMaths”
Special Educational Needs Co-Ordinators
ConquerMaths offers a unique way of helping students who are having particular difficulty in studying maths. It is also an ideal approach to help extend the work of key stage 3 pupils who are already pushing ahead and might want to take GCSE a year or two early.
In both cases the course offers a supplement to classroom work, but it can also be used as an alternative to the full-class lessons.
- Allows students to work at their own pace
- Involves multi-sensory input which improves comprehension and retention
- Helps students to improve their homework by revisiting the work done in school
- Makes revision far more effective, each student has their own area of difficulty
- Previous gaps in students' understanding can be filled in, making future lessons easier
- Works with students of all achievement levels
- 480 Animated and Narrated Maths Lessons covering the Entire English Maths Curriculum for ages 11-16
ConquerMaths is an on-line maths tutorial system which covers the whole of the Key Stage 3 and Key Stage 4 curricula and students work individually via the internet, allowing the student to study aspects of maths that have caused them a problem.
It is possible for the school to sign up individual students, small groups, or indeed the whole school – with some students working on remedial material and others who show particular ability in maths to take their grades up to a higher level.
Students who are registered with the system can use the materials as often as they like, when and where they like. They can log on at home, in the after-school club, during the lunch hour, and of course within school lessons.
You will be able to see exactly what each student has done, the grades achieved, the number of hours spent on line, and a host of other information, through the reports that are automatically generated each day as students use the system.
Try ConquerMaths Free!
In order to see how ConquerMaths works and the enormous impact that it can have on pupils and students, we’d be pleased to offer you a totally free, trial account. You can nominate up to 10 people to use the system (yourself, your colleagues in the department, your maths colleagues, plus some students if you wish) and they can utilise the service for 14 days, without any charge.
To take up this offer, just call 0191 240 1990 and tell us that you want to take up a SENCO Departmental Subscription or sign up on the Free Trial page.
