Julia, Maths Tutor

01/10/2026

Please sign, because nothing relating to children belongs in p**n.

25/09/2026

What happens when teachers get the space to teach? Follow me to find out.

25/09/2026

Student: My poor singular brain cell, I think I'm getting scammed.

(I had asked them to draw a graph...)

23/09/2026

I don’t expect to end up running for the Presidency but I do think I’ve got a shot at changing how students feel about maths, and I’m not throwing it away!

21/09/2026

It’s true that you have to get about double the marks on a Foundation paper to score a 5 in maths GCSE compared to Higher. Does that mean it’s easier on Higher? No, because doing Higher means covering masses more material.

The hardest questions on a Foundation paper are about as hard as the questions a quarter of the at through a Higher paper.

Is it easier to run 80% of a 5k or one third of a marathon?

What do you think? Like/follow for more maths sense.

21/09/2026

"Chinese students are better at maths because the structure of numbers in Mandarin is more logical and consistent than English, so they learn to count more quickly."

Is that an idea you've heard? It's re-surfaced on my feed recently because of the latest PISA results.

I remember thinking it sounded plausible when I first heard it a decade ago. English doesn't have a fully logical structure to its number names. The change of structure from 12 to 13 has no mathematical reason behind it, and the similarity of 'thirty' to 'thirteen' is not helpful. Italian has some similar idiosyncrasies (16 to 17 changes structure, incidentally meaning that 'becoming a teenager' has no Italian equivalent) and many people know about French and the numbers 80 and 90.

But when I learned Welsh, which has the same consistent, logical structure ('twenty' is 'two tens'), I found myself wondering why the Welsh weren't at the top of the PISA tables too. ("Shwmae" if you're a fellow siaradwyr, does dim llawer o pobl yn y fy ardal i sy'n siarad Cymraeg felly dw i'n wastad yn hapus i feindio mwy, croeso!)

So I chalked it up to "well, duh, no one element is going to explain it, and just because I love languages and therefore this explanation doesn't mean it's the thing".

EXCEPT then I ended up down a rabbit hole this weekend and it turns out speaking Welsh DOES give an advantage with learning to count! Even if it's not your first language:

https://www.tes.com/magazine/archive/welsh-makes-maths-easier

https://www.bbc.co.uk/future/article/20230511-whats-the-best-language-for-learning-maths

However, "Dowker concludes that the effects of language on numerical ability are subtle and specific rather than large and "pervasive". She certainly doesn't believe that linguistic transparence, alone, could explain why East Asian countries tend to be placed higher in educational league tables."

So we haven't actually located the secret sauce yet. (My money is on the extra planning time teachers get because how can you and your colleagues having time to plan together not be a good thing?)

Language can influence how quickly kids learn to count – but does it make a difference in the long run?

18/09/2026

Great maths tutoring is about so much more than explaining methods and checking answers. A great maths tutor gets to know you and helps you feel at ease with struggling.

16/09/2026

Mind Blown.

So what would you talk to her about next?

14/09/2026

Soon you’ll cover circles, you’ll probably pay so-so attention because you’ll assume that either this is a big topic so it will be built on, or it’s a small one and it doesn’t matter.

Then they won’t appear again until your mocks at which point you’ll barely remember them.

Every year, several students get caught out and are left wondering where the question they’re now staring at came from. Don’t be one of them! Learn circles properly and make sure you revise them for your mocks!

11/09/2026

Do you know someone who doesn’t dare to think their reasoning might be right?