Charity celebrates National Numeracy Day in Maths Champions nurseries
Representatives from National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA) celebrated the impact of its Maths Champions programme as part of National Numeracy Day on Wednesday 20 May.
NDNA’s CEO Tim McLachlan and Director of Quality and Training Stella Ziolkowski visited Toy Box Day Nursery. Paula Dunn, Quality and Fidelity Manager visited Danesmoor House Day Nursery in Darlington. The reps met with nursery managers and trained Maths Champions to highlight how nurseries are building confidence with numbers among children, staff and families.
The visits focused on their Maths Champions experiences, followed by guided learning walks demonstrating best practice in embedding maths into everyday play and routines. They looked at engaging maths activities and examples of how number skills are supported across the setting.
Claire McCartney, Manager of Toy Box Day Nursery said:
“Learning starts at home. Being able to participate in Maths Champions gives my team the confidence and understanding of how maths applies to so many areas of children’s learning and development.
“We work in partnership with parents and provide activities for all age ranges, that parents can do with their children in everyday life and this has boosted parents’ confidence as well!”
Stella Ziolkowski, NDNA’s Director of Quality and Training, said:
“One of the most important parts of Maths Champions is building practitioners’ confidence. When staff feel comfortable with maths themselves, they’re much more likely to spot those everyday opportunities to explore numbers, patterns and problem-solving with children.
“Each setting has a Champion and Deputy Champion who work alongside an NDNA mentor before sharing their learning with the rest of the team. That way the whole setting benefits and maths becomes part of the culture across the nursery.”
At Danesmoor House Day nursery, Alex Sayer (Maths Champion) and Jade Marsh (Deputy Maths Champion) said:
“We gained so much from the Maths Champions programme. It increased our knowledge and give us the opportunity to work together to look at what maths opportunities were already available in our settings and how we could enhance this.
“Number is much more prominent in nursery now. We have numbers and number lines in all rooms and outdoors and staff and children use this daily in their play and interactions.
“Through the staff confidence audits, we identified areas where staff felt less confident and we used resources from the programme to deliver training. We shared activity ideas with all staff and modelled activities and the use of maths language across routines and play.
We are thrilled to hear that more places on the Maths Champions programme will be funded by the DfE and we would really recommend the programme to anyone, it is a great experience.”
Paula Dunn, NDNA’s Quality and Fidelity Manager said:
“It was fantastic to see firsthand the impact of the Maths Champions programme at Danesmoor House Day Nursery.
“Alex and Jade initially joined the programme with the key aim of implementing more maths ideas into pre-school but it’s clear to see it has had a much greater effect than this.
“Both Alex and Jade talk enthusiastically about how their knowledge and confidence increased throughout the programme, how they bounced ideas off each other and how it has helped them to look at everything they do with children through a ‘maths lens’.
“Walking around the nursery and its grounds it’s clear to see all areas of maths embedded in practice, and in particular children are exposed to number and have conversations including number right across the day.”
The days concluded with photos of nursery staff and NDNA representatives celebrating their achievements and commitment to improving confidence in maths.
About the Maths Champions Programme
Maths Champions is a professional development programme which builds the knowledge of nursery practitioners to support children’s early mathematical development.
Research has shown that children who attend a Maths Champions setting make up to three months’ additional progress in their maths and language development, with this increasing to a potential six months for disadvantaged children (EEF 2023).
Find out more about Maths Champions here.
- childcare
- early education
- early maths skills
- early years
- England
- Maths Champions
- NDNA
- nurseries
- play based maths learning
- staff confidence in early maths
