Junior maths challenge 2025

Just went through the video answers with my son and he's got all the answers right (we looked at the questions first and he told me the solutions, then we watched the videos). I don't even understand most of the questions, let alone the answers!

However, it sounds like (as his headteacher suspected) he didn't show enough workings. He got confused by an instruction on the front page not to include rough workings so seems to have omitted a lot of the work he'd done on a separate piece of paper. And he didn't include any drawings 'because the answer sheet was lined and also I didn't need to do them'.

So it will be interesting to see how he is scored, given showing the workings is a big part of it! He can still do the JMO three more years so hopefully he learns from this experience. He loved doing the Olympiad so much - couldn't believe how pumped up he was before it, like he was going on an amazing school trip. Personally the idea of doing hard maths for two hours fills me with dread!

Foxhasbigsocks I know the feeling after experiencing it in the past. Sometimes my DD just refuses point blank to go back and look over things.

She did look at the Olympiad solutions though yesterday after school, she was in fact eager to. She compiled a range estimate for each question and then best guessed a particular number. That yielded 29-41 with a best guess of 34 or 35. I'd probably estimate a few marks less than that.

She says she got Q1 almost correct.... she specifically remembers the numbers 11 and 13, and almost sure she got 4329 for Q2. Claimed to do about a full page of workings for each of the 5 questions she answered but ummed and ahhdd a bit when she saw the solutions. Maybe she had a logical approach but it was flawed or slightly different to the textbook solutions. No point in delving any further really.

Wherever she lands it's been a good experience for her and will stand her in good stead if she qualifies next year. Like I've said all along I'd be more than happy with a Merit but perhaps, just perhaps, a Distinction could be a possibility. I'm giving it maybe 10%-20% chance.

This is because I wonder how the changes will pan out when it comes to the levels. Distn last yr was 38+ which going off previous year splits would likely be around 6+32 or 7+31, sect A/B. With section A off the table though it allows more time for candidates to consider section B. So perhaps the Distn threshold could be 35+, Bronze 40+?

I am doomed to be in total suspense as ds completely refuses to look at any of the solutions bar one. He only deigned to look at question 25 which he tells me he got right.

Gold Kangaroo is an achievement in itself. I don't think he'll bother about the 1 mark less.

Official Kangaroo solutions now out
ukmt.org.uk/competition-papers/jsf/jet-engine:free-past-papers/tax/challenge-type:68/#free-past-paper-anchor

And we missed another error, so DS has likely got 118. (Hope he's not annoyed as he got 119 last year).
Not bad at all, I imagine should be comfortably top 10% which is now a Gold Certificate rather then a merit I read here:

ukmt.org.uk/junior-challenges/junior-kangaroo-awards

Thank you.

I skipped all the videos and just had a quick look at the link to the written solutions below.

When my DD came home on Tuesday she said she'd done 5. Was very certain on 2 being very good, almost as certain on 2 more and unsure on 1 of them.

The very certains were Q3 and Q4. In fact she wrote out the questions and then worked through the solutions in front of me. She's got them both correct and from what I remember her workings/ rationale were very much in line with what the solutions are. If she's really gone 100% into the workings or not I'm not entirely sure of but I'd be surprised if she scored less than 15 across these 2.

The one she unsure about was 6. She says she did workings but we checked after and she got something like the 3rd or 4th smallest number and not the smallest number. She hoped she'd got maybe 4/5 marks on this.

Even with just these 3 she should be almost borderline Merit and I'd be more than happy if she achieves that. At 25%-65% it's as good as average of those who sat the exam.

I'll ask her about the others later today.

JMO solutions are out now: ukmt.org.uk/video-solutions-list/jsf/jet-engine:video-solutions-grid/tax/video-solution-challenge-type:204/

My DS sat the Olympiad yesterday. This was his first Olympiad (he did the Kangaroo last year). He didn't have much chance to practise, as this is his Year 8 exam week in school - 15 exams plus the Olympiad in 5 days 🙄 I think he'd only done 2 past papers. He wasn't sure what to expect. He said it was hard, but he answered all 6 questions. He found the first 2 OK, and thinks he got them right, felt reasonably OK about the next two, and said the last 2 were tricky but he did his best. I have no idea how.much he wrote. I think he enjoyed the experience, although the timing wasn't ideal with his other exams. Does anyone know when results are releaaed? Good luck to everyone for the Kangaroo and the Olympiad!

I guess Kangaroo is marked electronically from a marking sheet like JMC and it is only approx 10-12K entries Vs the 200K+ for JMC.
I hope we get results Mon 16th?

Wow Kangeroo results were quick last year

My DS got to take his physical home.
This is probably an error but the small number at his school all took it at same time.
Obviously I will not discuss any actual questions until results out, apologies if we've jumped gun.
The JMC paper was online in UKMT last month within a day or two.
Just FYI Last year's Kangaroo was on Tues11th and DS got told his result late on 17th

@Statistico are the Junior Kangaroo problems and answers out already?

We've had a look at Kangaroo answers and DS may have got 2 wrong so 124, exact same score as he got in JMC.
Both small slips i.e. calculation errors - one early on and one near end (so also exactly like JMC). Annoying for him as his method in the later, harder question was the smart route that makes it easier (often this relief can lead to a mistake)
The single thing that would improve his scoring would be a rigorous checking regime but that might suck the joy out of the whole thing at this age, that will come naturally when he's more 'on the page'
(Last year he also got the same score in both JMC and then again in Kangaroo)
Took A LOT of wickets last night too

I think about 3 weeks. Last yrs marking report said the scripts were marked 21st-23rd June. Then I came across an old thread on Mumsnet from a few yrs ago where people were saying results early July but then some seemed delayed, but that may have been the school rather than UKMT?

Does anyone know how long it takes for the JMO results to come out?

To be honest I think one should relax about Olympiad at Junior level.
IMHO precocity (is that a word) has been an historically overvalued trait in UK education. Very pleased to hear previous excellent primary school actively discouraging topic progression and deepening understanding instead and that is actually the goal of the whole UKMT endeavour and why for example you pretty much can do Kangaroo with barely any algebra -despite the official solutions being (overly) full of it!
To be able to construct the fully blocked-out logic for full Olympiad solutions is quite a bit away from where any 12 year old needs to be right now.
My DS could solve 5/6 of last year's Olympiad but presented little evidence so not the right exam for him currently. Kangaroo has been good fun instead.

Foxhasbigsocks I think 5% isnt necessarily bad generally but expected more from my DD's school.

I think the qualifiers for the follow on round exams give a feel for what the standard of the school is like. There can be a fine margin between Kangaroo and Olympiad. I told my DD this might be the last Olympiad she takes, next yr it'd be easy for her to get another Q wrong and be a Kangaroo.

Her school didn't prep specifically for it and maybe that partly explains it.

@Statistico this is very similar to what my ds said! He said he finished the paper and was able to go back and redo some.

@Jonny234 does that mean 12/240 = 5%? Is that not about right for the percentage doing follow on or am I missing something? If it’s top 5% taking it through to either Olympiad or Kangeroo? We had about 5% as well at our school with more from Year 8 than Year 7.

Happy for your DC. Good to hear the bit at the end, it'll go some way to engraining persistence in them.

4 from 50 is a good ratio. I was disappointed what I heard today from my DD regarding this at her school. She took the first hour alone, then 3 Yr7's and about 8 yr8's walked in and they all took the last hour together. Thats from a cohort of approx 240 across the 2 yr groups.

Not good enough. She's in the wrong school.

DC felt Kangaroo went well, he answered all with enough time to do some checking except one which he then excitedly managed to figure out in last 3min to go. So that alone is a great positive experience.
Only 4 go through to take Kangaroo from ~50 unprepared JMC entrants.

Great achievement just to take the exam at that age and he'll have loads more opportunities to refine his technique. I've thought before that the hard part even for my DD11 is attempting full workings. By what she's telling me she may have done a decent job on this today.

Son (9) said Olympiad went well and he thinks he got at least five questions right but only answered 2-3 in detail. Headmaster thinks he didn’t write enough detail in any of the answers. Will be fascinating to see the results

My DD emailed me post Olympiad this morning to say she completed 5/6 questions fully, left one altogether and wrote a lot of reasoning and about a full page on each.

At the time and without any further detail I did wonder if she meant what she wrote or she'd had a good stab at 5.

At that stage just hearing that she hadn't bombed gave me a big sense of relief. I'd have hated her to go in there and not be able to have a go at any.

Had a chat after school and it's dampened a bit from the headline but still promising. She thinks she'd done very well on 2, slightly less better on another 2, and got the answer wrong on one but may pick up a few marks for workings. She says her gut feeling is on the right side of half marks.

There are some big threshold gaps for most candidates and I just hope that unlike some unfortunate DC's who took the JMC she doesnt fall slightly short of one.

As for it being easier or harder than normal I've just asked and she said it was hard as usual. To her no discernable difference to past papers. I just hope the examiners made it a bit harder like a poster on here said they might going off past comments.