Babyzone has been named winner of both the Innovation and STEM awards at the Family Learning Awards 2026, recognising the impact of our Everyday Maths programme. The awards, run by the Campaign for Learning, celebrate organisations changing how families learn together. A win in two categories is a first for the awards and a strong endorsement of our approach to early maths.
Early maths skills are the single strongest predictor of later academic success, ahead of reading, attention and social skills (Duncan et al., 2007). They also build the executive function that underpins all learning. Yet only 40% of UK adults score highly for numerical competence, and one in five parents lacks confidence helping their child with maths at home.
Everyday Maths exists to close that gap, starting in the place that matters most: the home.
Everyday Maths is a practical, evidence-informed programme for families with children aged 2 to 5. It is practitioner-led and delivered through Babyzone hubs, and it helps parents and carers spot the maths already present in everyday moments.
The programme runs across 40 weeks, with 20 sessions of 25 minutes repeated twice a year. Each session is grounded in one of seven everyday settings, from kitchen maths to garden and nature maths to playtime maths, so that learning transfers naturally into home life.
Every session follows a simple Pose, Play, Ponder cycle. A prompt sparks curiosity, children explore through hands-on activity, then adults and children reflect together using maths language. The programme is grounded in the latest research on early childhood mathematics and mapped to Stanford DREME and England's EYFS framework.
The results speak for themselves. To date, Everyday Maths has delivered 243 sessions across 6 hubs, reaching 1,459 families. After just six weeks, 78% of carers reported increased confidence with maths and 100% reported a broader understanding of what early maths really is.
Families tell us the change is real. As one parent at Babyzone Hammersmith and Fulham put it, "I've become more confident that it isn't too young to introduce maths, because she grasps it. Starting early makes it less daunting." A parent at Babyzone Croydon added that the sessions "provide practical tools to do maths in a fun and low-stress way."
The double win reflects growing recognition of the programme beyond our hubs. Professor Eric Dearing of Stanford University and DREME praised the approach, saying Babyzone "has done a beautiful job of building on the ways in which opportunities for early maths learning surround all children and families in their day-to-day lives," offering "powerful, sustained ways for families to help children realise their full potential."