Mumsnet users review EdPlace’s online Maths activities and revision materials

[EllieMumsnet]

This activity is now closed

This is the feedback thread for the 50 MNers who tested out EdPlace’s online Maths activities and revision materials with their DC. This service test was open to all UK MNers with children who are preparing for their year 6 SATs and need an educational boost in Maths.

If you don't fancy reading the full thread, you can take a look at the highlights here: Mumsnetters review Edplace

All testers were required to complete 20 or more activities across the 4 week period in order to gain the most out of the service in the follow up to SATs, however if you are a regular subscriber to EdPlace you are able to complete as many or as few activities as you like.

Non-testers, in order to to be entered into a prize draw where one MNer will win a £150 Amazon voucher, please answer the following question/complete the following statement: What does ‘success’ mean to you? If easier, you can complete the following statement; “Success is seeing my child…”

Here’s what EdPlace has to say: “We are a National Curriculum aligned, online learning hub dedicated to helping your child achieve their best in English, maths and science from Year 1- GCSE. Trusted by tutors and parents, we help boost results via our worksheets, assessments and revision materials - taking your child on a personalised learning journey to success. This exam period, we’re shining a light on the positive impact education can have on a child’s confidence and development. Let’s #ReviseandShine by sharing what success means above and beyond exams.”

For the trial, each participant and their DC were required to:

• Complete a minimum of 5 maths activities a week.
• Complete an initial and final assessment to measure their progress.

Each participant and their DC received:

• A personalised learning journey devised by a tutor.
• Access to EdPlace’s English, maths and science subscription with 1000s of online worksheets, assessments, maths tutorial videos and revision materials.
• Progress monitoring to ensure they’re on the right track.
• Weekly progress reports for the parent to give them visibility to their child’s development and comprehension levels

Testers please answer the following questions:

1. Overall how satisfied were you with EdPlace?
2. Did both you and your DC enjoy using EdPlace?
3. What did you and your DC like most about EdPlace?
4. Do you think EdPlace helped get your child ready for their Maths SATs exam?
5. Would you recommend EdPlace to a friend or family member?

Testers who give the required feedback will be entered into a prize draw, where one tester will receive a £100 voucher of their choice (from a list).

Thanks and good luck
MNHQ

Standard Insight T&Cs Apply

1. Very satisfied.

1. I liked it.

I would not say DS enjoyed it. But he preferred it to Bond 11+, because it was closer to his school curriculum. TBH I have also bribed DS with little rewards (cards he collects) for completing his work.

1. I really liked the focus on a small topic and then practicing it relentlessly while DS mastered it.

1. Yes, absolutely. Although we practice with him anyway. DH does not think the school sets enough homework.

1. Yes. It is perfect for complementing their studies in school.

Oh, and I hope you do not mind but I have also shown EdPlace to DS's firm teacher. It is good for them to know.

I mean form teacher.

1. Overall how satisfied were you with EdPlace?

Very satisfied. I had twins completing the trial and it acted as a structure and confidence boost for one which she needed and for the other it was a fun way to consolidate her understanding.

1. Did both you and your DC enjoy using EdPlace?

Both girls were enthusiastic to start with but needed a little chivvying along in thr later weeks. Onve They actually started the activities they were both engaged and happy. I liked it because it remived the need from me to be overly involved in their learning and thus reduced tension between us

1. What did you and your DC like most about EdPlace?

Short topic based teats that could be done in a group of a few at a time or picked up as a when they had 5 minutes spare.

I liked the ability to view their overall progress and to be able to easily identify strongest and weakest areas

1. Do you think EdPlace helped get your child ready for their Maths SATs exam?

I think both came away more confident in their abilities and therefore felt more relaxed going into their exams which definitely helped

1. Would you recommend EdPlace to a friend or family member?

Yes

1. Overall how satisfied were you with EdPlace?

Easy to use, easy to login and could use it on a variety of devices - would recommend

2. Did both you and your DC enjoy using EdPlace?

Yes Ds liked Paul and that he could pick the order to do the sheets in. I was just happy he was doing some revision!

3. What did you and your DC like most about EdPlace?

Ease of use - he could do it in the car on trips to football training either on tablet or phone

4. Do you think EdPlace helped get your child ready for their Maths SATs exam?

It complemented school work and the initial test then led to more revision on weaker topics

5. Would you recommend EdPlace to a friend or family member?

Yes, as long as not too expensive. Kids love using apps and this definitely helped

1. very satisfied with ed place
2. yes we enjoyed using ed place 3)I think it helped DS be more confident with his tests although he was a bit upset when he got things wrong
3. yes definitely I found it helped with his confidence and making him know he can do it 5)yes I would recommend although we didn't get to finish due to a bereavement but would use with other children

1. Overall how satisfied were you with EdPlace?

The concept is fab, the site worked well and the updates are very helpful.

1. Did both you and your DC enjoy using EdPlace?

My DD very much lacks in confidence regarding maths. We went into this hoping it would help her but instead it left her feeling overwhelmed due to the SATs revision she was getting at school. Also she tried hard with every worksheet and each time she got things wrong it really got her down.

1. What did you and your DC like most about EdPlace?

I liked knowing what her worksheets were for the week. DD liked the layout of the site.

1. Do you think EdPlace helped get your child ready for their Maths SATs exam?

Unfortunately not particularly. I understand that my daughter does struggle and that is not EdPlaces responsibility but the final parent feedback I received was very poor. My daughter was relentlessly sent similar worksheets (which obviously was her very weak point) but no different learning explanations. So if she failed it on week 1 because she didn't understand, she continued to fail for the whole thing.

1. Would you recommend EdPlace to a friend or family member?

Possibly

. Overall how satisfied were you with EdPlace?

I liked the concept and thought it would be useful, dc wasn't able to complete all activities due to some issues at home but he enjoyed the activities he tried, he did find the wording a little confusing . He hasn't completed the final assessment as he gets to q14 and gets logged out and has to start again its happened 3 times now we aren't sure why.

1. Did both you and your DC enjoy using EdPlace?

DC didn't mind it, there were aspects he was struggling with which he liked being able to go over using the section activities. I think with the school revision club, homework and ed place it was all just a bit much .

1. What did you and your DC like most about EdPlace?

easy to use site and the emails updating on progress meant that I got an overview of things he was struggling with particularly which was helpful for going over this.

1. Do you think EdPlace helped get your child ready for their Maths SATs exam?

I think it helped him to identify things he needed to revise further but he found it quite stressful on top of other homework and revision clubs.

1. Would you recommend EdPlace to a friend or family member?

Possibly if it were more to find out which areas a child needed to go over or revise further.

1. Overall how satisfied were you with EdPlace?

Excellent service, very easy to set up. Then my 10 year old was able to go on and get going without logging in each time. I then was able to keep track of his progress through weekly emails...and remind him to complete taskes!

1. Did both you and your DC enjoy using EdPlace?

I enjoyed it, but personally think it was a bit too much for my DS. After constant revision, mocks etc at school, the last thing he wanted to do was more work.

1. What did you and your DC like most about EdPlace?

The ease of use, and for me the weekly email to let me know what he was doing etc.

1. Do you think EdPlace helped get your child ready for their Maths SATs exam?

Not sure yet, there was a lot of pressure at school, so I'm hoping this on top wasnt too much.

1. Would you recommend EdPlace to a friend or family member?

Yes, but not at SAT's time

1. I was quite satisfied with the layout. The weekly email update gave very limited information and none on where they needed further help.

1. Ds enjoyed it to start of with but we both thought having an area for working out would be advantageous.

3.The explanations for incorrect answers were very clear.

4.ds lost interest quite quickly as correct answers were marked incorrectly. I've always taught him to show his working out as points cant be gained even if an answer is incorrect if you show the correct method. He struggles not being able to do this. I dont feel that he gained anything from it and he felt he had extra pressure put on him.

1. It would entirely depend on the child some questions only made sense to my d's when I went through it with him even though t was an area he doesn't struggle with at school.

1. Overall how satisfied were you with EdPlace?
Pretty satisfied. It gave my DS a great opportunity to revise his maths ahead of his SATs and it made it easy to identify the weak areas in his knowledge that required more work. I particularly like the fact that he got instant feedback on incorrect answers so he could find out where he had gone wrong straight away. I think that is a much more effective way of learning than completing a practice paper, marking it, and only then going through the incorrect answers. It also meant that more of his revision time was spent efficiently improving his knowledge in the most needed areas.

2. Did both you and your DC enjoy using EdPlace?
I subscribe to a couple of other educational packages, Reading Eggs and Nessy, and EdPlace wasn't as enjoyable to use as these, which manage to combine education with a bit of fun. But on the other hand, EdPlace is a good halfway house between the education apps for younger children and the more self-directed topics of e.g. GCSE Bitesize. So EdPlace isn't necessarily that enjoyable to use but that doesn't mean it isn't valuable as a stepping stone in the education pathway.

3. What did you and your DC like most about EdPlace?
My DS liked the fact that each activity was quite short so he could fit a bit of revision into even the smallest space of time. He also liked being able to choose which order he did the activities in, so sometimes he would do an activity he was confident in, and have the confidence boost of getting 100%, or sometimes he would challenge himself to improve in a problem area.
I liked the feedback on the number of activities completed, and the identification of problem areas. That made it much easier for me to focus on the most productive areas when helping him with his revision.

4. Do you think EdPlace helped get your child ready for their Maths SATs exam?
My DS is good at Maths and was pretty confident he would do well in the exams, but I think EdPlace helped him to be more certain of achieving Greater Depth in his SATs. He wants to go into engineering so Maths is really important to him and being able to achieve a high mark at this stage is a good foundation for when he goes on to high school.

5. Would you recommend EdPlace to a friend or family member?
Yes I would. I think the package is great, well tailored to the SATs, and a much more appealing way to prepare than the written papers. My DS did plenty of written papers in school and might have got a little burned out by having to do more papers at home. It was pretty easy to get him to sit down at the computer for 10-30 minutes to use EdPlace. He knew he had to complete five activities per week which wasn't too much pressure but at the same time gave him a good frequency of revision - much more useful than frantic last-minute preparation.

I have two younger DCs and will definitely consider signing them up for EdPlace when they reach years 5 and 6. We only tested the Maths activities so it will be interesting to find out whether the Literacy activities are just as useful.

Hi everyone,

EdPlace have been reading through all your feedback so far and have this to say:

"Hi Mumsnetters, we’re really enjoying reading your comments! We hope your DCs’ SATs went well and they’re looking forward to their Summer break.

It’s been wonderful to hear EdPlace has helped several of your DCs' confidence grow in the lead up to SATs. We’ve also noticed a few recurring themes throughout the thread that we'd like to follow up on.

We read a few of you were having trouble with answers not saving when an activity is left partly completed. Can you send us an email at [email protected] with more details? This shouldn't be happening. All answers should save along the way, even if your DC hasn't fully completed the activity. Sounds like a bug we need to squash!

We’ve also seen some concerns regarding the curriculum; all our activities are 100% National Curriculum aligned. In fact, all our activities are created by teachers with 5+ years experience. Many parents use our service throughout the year to help supplement their child's school work.

Additionally, it appears there was a bit of confusion around direct access to a tutor. For this particular study, we used qualified maths tutors to help choose the correct activities for your child. Each week, our tutors assigned new EdPlace activities to your DC's account and selected activities based on their progress over the previous week. This was highlighted in the welcome email, but we apologise if this wasn't made clear enough. Thank you for your feedback and suggestions on how to improve the weekly progress report, these are greatly appreciated and we'll be using them to make this report more effective.

We’ve also found your feedback on our activity format really useful and insightful, so thank you. We’re updating this now, and your suggestions have been taken on board.

We hope you enjoyed using EdPlace, and hope we can help your child succeed in the future.”

1. I found the activities ok but I didn’t find the site overly engaging. My son likes visual sites with lots of colour, sounds and interaction and he found the site boring. I think the aim of the site is a great idea but we had tears over doing the activities because he was being bombarded with activities at school in preparation for the SATS. This made it really hard to complete the tasks, I was pleading with him to finish but he wasn’t engaged at all.

1. The experience wasn’t very enjoyable because he was on overload from school SATS practice and completely shut down. He lacks so much confidence in Maths and this leads to avoidance.

1. I liked the content of questions and how each topic was explained. I think the site needs to become more child friendly as they are still young at 10/11 and still like learning to be fun. As an adult I learnt things I’d forgotten but it didn’t capture his attention so much.

1. No because he wouldn’t give it a chance, I believe it could have if he had engaged with the sessions.

1. Yes if you made the site more visually attractive, fun, engaging and child friendly. The contents is great, it just needs to look more visually appealing for kids.

1. Overall how satisfied were you with EdPlace? I was fairly satisfied. I think it provided extra practice for my DS leading up to the SATs.

1. Did both you and your DC enjoy using EdPlace? I had hoped we'd both enjoy it a little more. I found it stressful to get reminder emails late in the week to say that he needed to finish all his worksheets by Friday and he found it demotivating to login and find a huge list of worksheets to complete. The assumption/ suggestion was that these ALL had to be completed.

1. What did you and your DC like most about EdPlace? Easy to use on mobile device or laptop. Readily accessible worksheets, broken down by topic.

1. Do you think EdPlace helped get your child ready for their Maths SATs exam? I think that the extra practice must have helped! Not sure it was quite as tailored as we'd imagined it would be though.

1. Would you recommend EdPlace to a friend or family member? Depending on what they needed it for, I probably would if I thought it was going to be helpful.

1. Overall how satisfied were you with EdPlace?

We both found it really easy to use and I do think it helped DS with confidence building as well as math skills.

1. Did both you and your DC enjoy using EdPlace?

DS did moan a bit about having to take time to complete it but I do think he enjoyed it.

1. What did you and your DC like most about EdPlace?

I liked the fact it was broken down into small chunks.

1. Do you think EdPlace helped get your child ready for their Maths SATs exam?

I do think it to helped DS, he helped him see how much he knew and really built his confidence.

1. Would you recommend EdPlace to a friend or family member?

Yes I would, we will be looking at it for DD next year for SATs prep.

1. Overall how satisfied were you with EdPlace?

We were really pleased. DS was actually asking to do the activities which is amazing! He seemed to get a lot out of it.

1. Did both you and your DC enjoy using EdPlace?

We did. DS was engaged and excited which made getting the extra practice in much easier than it would otherwise have been.

1. What did you and your DC like most about EdPlace?

DS liked the individual challenges as he enjoyed working through them and ticking them off. We liked the weekly reports which helped us see how he was doing.

1. Do you think EdPlace helped get your child ready for their Maths SATs exam?

I think it helped a lot with his confidence. We'll have to wait for the results to see if it helped with his score.

1. Would you recommend EdPlace to a friend or family member?

I would yes. If a child needed just a little extra help then it would be ideal.

1. We were satisfied but needs a bit of improvement
2. We both enjoyed using edplace
3. We could both check her progress, and also check what she got wrong and where.
4. Somewhat as we only had a week or two to use edplace so not sure if that had an impact at all.
5. Yes I will but with improvements been made like having the assistant get back to you in 24hrs at least

Success is seeing my child grow into a happy, healthy and worry free person

Success is seeing my child happy!

Success is seeing my child proudly showing me something new that they have learnt to do.

Success is achieving your potential

Success is being happy in your life whatever form that ultimately takes.

Success is seeing my chilld be a kind and happy person.

Success is seeing my child happy and fulfilled.

Success is seeing my child happy and confident.
:)