IGCSE Add Math Exam Guide
Understanding Your Child's Add Math Report
Written by the Add Math team · Reviewed by Rig, our founder
8 years teaching IGCSE & SPM maths
An Add Math grade on a school report is a single letter standing in for a lot of detail, and parents often can’t tell from it whether their child is fine, drifting, or in genuine difficulty. Reading a 0606 report well means looking past the letter to what’s actually driving it, and knowing which questions to ask.
A grade is a symptom, not a diagnosis
The same grade can have completely different causes. A B might mean solid understanding let down by careless working, or genuinely shaky grasp of a couple of big topics, or strong ability masked by exam nerves. Those need very different responses, so the grade alone can’t tell you what to do. The useful information is why, and that rarely appears on the report.
The gap between current and predicted grade
Many reports show a working (current) grade and a predicted (target) grade. The space between them is the most informative part. A working grade well below the prediction usually means the potential is real but something is leaking marks, which is good news, because leaks are fixable in a way a true ability ceiling is not. If the two grades match at a modest level, the question is whether the foundation is solid enough to build on.
The three questions worth asking
At a parents’ evening or by email, ask the teacher three specific things:
- Which topics is my child weakest in? This turns “needs to improve” into an actionable list.
- Are the lost marks about understanding, or about working and execution? A knowledge gap and an execution gap need opposite fixes.
- Is the foundation solid? Weak algebra, surds or index work undermines everything above it and must come first.
Those answers tell you far more than the grade, and they tell you what kind of help would actually move it.
What to do with the answers
If the issue is foundations, that’s the priority before more Add Math practice. If it’s a couple of weak topics, targeted work on those, paired with the relevant worked examples, is efficient. If it’s execution, past-paper practice with honest marking is the lever. And if you can’t tell which it is, that’s exactly what a specialist diagnoses in an hour, the 1-hour trial class exists to answer precisely this question. Message us on WhatsApp with what the report says, and we’ll help you read it.