MathsMission

How to help your child learn times tables at home

Five minutes a day, most days, beats an hour at the weekend. Here is the routine we build MathsMission around, and you can follow it with or without us.

The five-minute routine

  1. One minute of warm-up. Practise a table your child already knows. Start with a win, not a struggle.
  2. Two minutes on the current table. Just one table at a time. Say it, then mix the order so it isn't recited from memory of the list.
  3. One minute on the tricky facts. Almost every child has three or four facts that stick — often 6×7, 7×8, 8×9 and 12×7. Practise only those.
  4. One minute of division. "56 divided by 8" proves the fact is really known, not just recited.

Which table to start with

Follow school order rather than 2× to 12× in sequence: 2×, 5× and 10× first, then 3×, then 4× and 8× (double the 2×, then double again), then 6×, 7×, 9×, 11× and 12×. Our year-by-year guide shows what is expected in your child's school year.

What actually helps

  • Accuracy before speed. A timer on a table your child hasn't learnt yet teaches panic. Add the timer once answers are reliable.
  • Race their own score, not a classmate's. Beating yesterday's score is motivating for every child, not just the fastest one.
  • Repeat what went wrong immediately. Going straight back over missed facts is the single biggest difference between practice that works and practice that doesn't.
  • Say answers out loud. Recall out loud is faster to build than recall on paper.
  • Stop while it's still going well. Five good minutes, then finish.

Common worries

My child knows them but is too slow.
That's normal, and it's a separate skill. Short timed bursts on tables they already know accurately turn working out into recall.
They get upset about being tested.
Drop the timer entirely for a couple of weeks and use short untimed rounds where they can see their own score improving.
How long until they know them all?
With five minutes most days, a single new table typically settles in two to three weeks. All the way to 12× is a school-year-long job, not a half-term one.

Try the routine now

Use our free times tables practice or free division practice — no sign-up. If you'd like the missions picked automatically each day, plus progress you can see, start a 7-day family trial (£4.99 a month afterwards for up to three children).