The gap between practice and preparation
Formal practice is only part of what builds a child's readiness. The rest is fluency — the things that need to be automatic so that attention is free for the actual question.
Times tables, to genuine fluency
- Not "can work it out" but "knows it instantly".
- Two minutes in the car is enough, most days.
- The gain shows up in speed on the Maths paper, which is where time is lost.
Reading aloud, a few minutes
Reading aloud does something silent reading does not: it forces every word to be processed. It surfaces the words a child skims past, which are usually the ones they do not know.
Arithmetic in ordinary moments
Change in a shop, minutes until something starts, how many days until an event. Mental arithmetic used for a real purpose sticks better than a worksheet, and it costs nothing.
Why this beats another session
A child has a limited appetite for sitting down to practise, and spending it wisely matters. These habits do not draw on that budget at all — which is what makes them worth more than their five minutes suggests.
Read next
- P5, P6 or P7: when to start preparing
- Building vocabulary for the Transfer Test
- What a standardised score actually means
Dates, scoring and assessment details are set by SEAG and can change — always confirm the current position on the official SEAG website. Our key dates page lists the 2026–27 milestones.