What is Maths Pathway Homeschool?
Maths Pathway Homeschool is a personalised maths program designed for homeschooling families. It’s developed from the proven Maths Pathway approach used in schools, adapting it to suit the flexibility and independence of home education. The program provides explicit instruction, guiding students through mathematical concepts with clarity and confidence.
With a strong focus on differentiated learning, Maths Pathway Homeschool ensures that students receive the right level of challenge and support based on their individual learning needs. Parents have access to detailed insights and reports, helping them track their child’s progress and understand their learning journey. By combining personalised content with engaging activities, Maths Pathway Homeschool empowers mathematics learning while maintaining the flexibility that homeschooling offers.
What age groups is Maths Pathway Homeschool suitable for?
Maths Pathway Homeschool is typically used by students from grade 5 to year 10. Grade 5 is generally the youngest age group recommended for Maths Pathway, as most students will have the literacy and independent learning skills necessary to make the most of the opportunity. Some schools do work with younger students when there is evidence that those literacy and independent learning skills are sufficiently developed.
How is Maths Pathway Homeschool different from other maths programs?
1. Personalised Learning for Every Child: Instead of a one-size-fits-all approach, Maths Pathway adapts to each student’s learning level. Children work on what they’re ready for, ensuring they master concepts before moving on.
2. Focus on Growth, Not Just Grades: The program measures progress based on growth, accuracy and effort rather than just test scores, helping students build confidence and a solid foundation in maths.
3. Differentiation: Unlike traditional programs, Maths Pathway provides targeted teaching to address gaps and extend learning. Differentiation ensures each child receives the right level of support or challenge.
4. A Balanced Blend of Digital and Hands-On Learning: The program combines online tools with written work and problem-solving activities, helping students develop deep mathematical understanding.
5. Parent Portal with Built-in Support: Homeschooling parents receive guidance and insights into their child’s progress, making it easier to teach maths effectively—even without a maths background.
6. Mastery-Based Learning: Students revisit and reinforce concepts over time, ensuring they retain knowledge rather than just cramming for tests.
What content do students get access to?
Students will have access to content they are ready for from the curriculum relevant to their state (Aus Curriculum 8.4, 9.0, NSW Syllabus 2024, Vic Curriculum 2.0) from level 1 all the way to 10A. It provides comprehensive coverage of all curriculum content from level 4 to 10A, as well as the prerequisite skills to prepare students for that content.
Do you do a pre-test before each topic?
At the beginning of a student’s Math Pathway journey, they complete an adaptive online diagnostic. This assessment covers all strands and provides you with a complete learning profile for each student. It is completed over multiple sittings (for periods of 40 minutes or 30 minutes) to ensure that students can concentrate and provide an accurate account of their understanding.
This information informs the work they get access to in each unit and is updated at the completion of each test. The best thing is that once the student has completed the diagnostic, their profile can rollover into the following year and they can pick up where they left off.
Another tool to ensure students are spending their time learning what’s right for them are entrance tickets. Before commencing their modules each day, students complete an entrance ticket, which provides a secondary opportunity for students to show what they know and prevent them from spending time working on maths they already understand. If they answer the entrance ticket correctly, they can add that module to their test immediately and move onto more challenging materials. If they answer them incorrectly, it’s still a valuable experience as it helps them to focus on the key ideas of the module as they complete it.
What supports are available to students who struggle with literacy?
The Maths Pathway modules are carefully designed to ensure that the literacy demands are no greater than the mathematical demands. I.e. If it is a level 5 module, it will require no greater than level 5 literacy to access it. The modules are also rich with visual representations and students can receive immediate feedback on each question they complete by checking the answer. In addition to these fundamental design considerations, students can also use the text-to-speech function or watch a video providing some additional dynamic instruction on their module.
How do you keep students on task when using devices?
Three major factors support student engagement with Maths Pathway:
- Many students disengage from their learning because they have limited experiences of making meaning or achieving success in mathematics. By giving students access to well-scaffolded materials they are ready to learn, students often experience success, which builds engagement.
- Students have clear expectations of the work they are expected to complete, and the teacher has two main ways of tracking their progress.
- Easy-to-read and updated live, Maths Pathway provides a simple Activity Tracking report, showing if students are up to date with work expectations.
- Students also complete their work in an exercise book, providing a secondary form of evidence as to the work they have completed.
If the student is warned about being off task when using their device, the teacher has the option to easily print off the module(s) for that student and provide a paper alternative to the screen. This may be a one-off consequence or an ongoing preferred way of learning, depending on the student.
- If a student is struggling with any of their modules, they can always use the help prompts (checking the answer or watching the video), or the teacher can provide a targeted intervention. Armed with a report showing the details of the module and the history of the student with it, the teacher can provide the additional instruction and practice the student requires to make sense of the materials.
How do we know that students are actually learning?
When students are completing their module work, they are working towards the successful completion of an Exit Ticket. The student needs to answer the exit ticket questions correctly in order for the module to be completed and added to their upcoming test.
Each topic culminates in an assessment that is generated. On that date, the system generates an individualised test for each student based on the modules they have completed and the exercises the teacher has assigned. Students need to successfully answer all the assessment questions for a given module to “master” it and for them to continue to move forward in their learning pathway. If they fail to master the module, they will be prompted to reattempt that module during the next unit of work and show their mastery on the subsequent test. They will be provided some additional feedback to help them attend to what is important in that module, while the teacher may also choose to provide some additional instruction. This process ensures that students are only progressing in their learning based on demonstrating their understanding, setting them up for success in making sense of the more complex materials that follow.
Will students forget what they’ve learned?
One major reason students have gaps in their knowledge is that they’ve forgotten things they’d previously learned. Our brains can’t retain all the information we are exposed to in our lives. It is a natural, healthy process for information that is trivial or irrelevant to fade from our memories. When building a comprehensive knowledge base across the field of mathematics, it’s important to retain what you’ve learned over an extended period. Maths Pathway is informed by learning science that indicates that providing opportunities to retrieve knowledge in repeated bouts at increasing intervals is the best way to do that.
For students using Maths Pathway, before they commence a module to learn new maths each day, they first complete a brief warm-up with questions on materials they’ve previously learned. A clever algorithm selects which questions to pose to students to maximise the impact on their brains. Importantly, what is shown in these warm-ups is unique to each student because they have different knowledge bases and different amounts of time since learning different materials.
A second way to gather evidence that students have retained what they’d previously learned is to have students sit longer form, written exams, on materials drawn from customised timeframes. The Maths Pathway exam generation tool is simple to use, allowing you to select the length of the exam and the time period it draws questions from, dedicating a portion of individualised questions based on the students’ module work and the exposure lessons you have taught. The PDF comes complete with worked solutions for each question, making marking a streamlined process.
What should I expect when I get started?
Once you sign up for your 14-day free trial, our team will send you an email with a welcome video and activity to get started. Within 24 hours, you will receive your login details and diagnostic codes so that you can begin your diagnostic test. Throughout your free trial, we will send you helpful emails and videos explaining different features so that you understand each step, from sign-up to your first test.
If I have any questions or need support, who can I speak to?
Our homeschool support team is available Monday – Friday, 9 am – 5 pm, to answer any questions you may have. You can contact us at [email protected]
