No thinking allowed: DfE’s new times tables test for eight- and nine-year-olds aims to stop them using reasoning to work out answers

Nick Gibb refusing to answer times tables questions on Good Morning Britain in February 2018

The government’s new times tables test for year four pupils has been explicitly designed to rule out the possibility that they might think their way towards the answers, critics have highlighted as the assessments loom for children.

The new check gives eight- and nine-year-olds just six seconds to answer each of 25 questions on their times tables up to 12 – with the Department for Educating stating, in the assessment’s specification, that the short timeframe was set as such to deny children “enough time to work out the answer”.

The test is widely seen as the personal initiative of the rote learning enthusiast Nick Gibb, the former schools minister. It will be introduced in June – meaning that primary school pupils now face more assessments than they did before the pandemic – despite Gibb having lost his position last year.

There is controversy, too, about the pass mark for the new assessments. In advice for parents published last November, the DfE said that “there is no pass mark for the check”.