Focus Question: How can we keep students motivated through the winter?
Introduction
Our second National Online Event was held on 26 November 2025, where we asked: How can we help students tackle their maths gaps post-diagnostics? It was a really thought-provoking discussion on the challenges winter can bring for students.
Below, you can find out about what we explored and some of the insights discussed in our breakout sessions.
1) Exploring the Question
This session looked at why motivation often dips for GCSE resit and Functional Skills learners during the winter months, and what colleges can practically do in response. We began by mapping the FE year – from enrolment and November entries through to summer exams – and asking when students’ “100 points” of motivation tend to get spent. Mentimeter responses showed clear peaks in September and around exam points, with a noticeable tailing-off across late autumn and winter.
Drawing on the Centres for Excellence in Maths (CfEM) work on motivation and engagement, we explored how negative prior experiences of maths, exam anxiety, attendance challenges and wider life pressures combine with the darker months to create a “winter dip”. Rather than seeing this as inevitable, the session focused on evidence-informed principles for re-engaging learners: building strong relationships, emphasising progress over perfection, making maths feel relevant to students’ lives, and creating routines that promote success for all.
A key example was a ‘College Certificate’ in Financial Literacy, used to tap into learners’ real interests and provide a short-term, tangible goal. The certificate framework allows students to work towards something concrete while strengthening core skills such as proportion, percentages, multiplicative reasoning, decimals and place value through contexts like comparing prices, interest, tax, discounts, payslips, budgets and exchange rates.
2) Discussion and Collaboration
Mentimeter and breakout discussions painted a rich picture of the winter challenge. Colleagues highlighted factors such as dark, cold days, illness, long terms, exam fatigue after the November resit, and the perception that maths is no longer needed if students believe they have already “done enough”. In some colleges, attendance drops sharply after November results, and motivation is further affected by travel difficulties, cost-of-living pressures and students’ wider responsibilities.
When asked about barriers, practitioners pointed to high absence rates, large and mixed-ability classes, changing exam boundaries and the difficulty of sustaining enthusiasm for a subject that many learners still associate with past failure. Yet the same discussions surfaced a wealth of practical strategies that are already making a difference in FE classrooms. Examples included:
• Using quizzes, games and competitions to create low-stakes practice
• Varying lesson structure, breaking learning into chunks and building in movement or different activities
• Linking maths explicitly to real-life aspirations – independence, work, driving, managing money – so that effort feels worthwhile
• Prioritising relationships: warm classrooms, informal conversations, noticing effort, and showing genuine interest in students’ work
• Offering enrichment and extra-curricular maths opportunities, as well as whole-group whiteboard work and targeted small-group tasks.
Colleagues also reflected on how ideas like a College Certificate in Financial Literacy could be adapted locally, for example by co-designing criteria with learners, collaborating with vocational staff, or using certificates as a way to celebrate progress mid-year, not just at final exams.
3) Shared Links and Resources
Several useful resources and readings were highlighted for colleagues who want to explore motivation and financial contexts further:
A detailed guide to the key principles of motivation and engagement in FE maths, with practical case studies and strategies.
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Oak National Academy – Financial Education Units
Ready-made teaching sequences using financial contexts
These resources offer possible adaptable ideas to help make maths feel relevant, future-focused and worth the effort, particularly valuable during the winter dip.
Join us for our next event
Thank you for joining us for our first National Online Event. Our next event will be held on Wednesday, 14 January 2026. Where we ask: How can we help all students to improve using results from the November exams?