It's beneficial for learners to be able to recall their addition and subtraction number bonds to ten fluently - this frees up working memory for problem solving and higher order analytic thinking. It also introduces the strategy of breaking numbers into parts in order to simplify operations such as addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.

The Number Bond Challenge is essentially a number bond question generator for class and individual practice.

There are 5 steps:

1. Choose your Bond family - children may need to be prompted to come back here to choose another bond family after completing the first one!
2. Break into Parts - this allows children to Chop the number into the available parts. You'll see that we haven't included zero as a part. Also note the sentence below indicating how many breaks you've made.
3. Whole and Parts - a familiar model from "Singapore Maths"
4. Practice the Number Bonds -  generates the relevant bonds for each "break". Simply click on the place holders to answer each question. The bonds are complete learners will see a link to "Make a New Break" which prompts them to break the number into different parts.

This video can be used to explain the Whole and Parts model for Number Bonds:

When learner the has practised all the number bonds to 10  - the bond family chooser (Step 1) will display a "completed tick" for each bond family:

We've built in flexibility so you can use it in a variety of ways. There are also options for use where the classroom technology is limited.

Here are some of the ways to use it:

• As a complete homework activity: The Number Bond Challenge was originally made for home use and you can see the home version here. To use it as a homework you'll need to direct pupils (and parents) to komodomath.com/nbb  Here are some homework-slips (pdf) you can distribute. It may be a good idea to introduce it as a whole class activity before using it as a homework.
• As a whole class activity: The Number Bond Challenge is suitable to use as a whole class activity. It will work well on an interactive whiteboard. Step 5 ( the quiz ) is best used at home as a certificate and feedback is emailed privately to parents on completion. Tip: Click hide/show at the bottom of the the right hand column to hide the reviews and other distractions.
• As an individual learner classroom activity: If you have access to a suite of tablets or laptops you can use the Number Bond Challenge in small groups or individually. The practice grid exercise can be repeated without refreshing the page. Step 5 ( the quiz ) is best used at home since a certificate is emailed to parents on completion.

The Number Bonds quiz is a multiple choice quiz that measures how accurately and quickly number bonds to 10 are answered. It's designed as a homework task and is fun and engaging - please give it a run through to see. At the end of the quiz, all learners receive a certificate - here's a sneak peek and an accuracy and fluency report  - as seen here.

At the start of the quiz, we ask for a parent's email address so we can send both the report and certificate to them. Parent and learner contact information is kept private and they can opt out at any time.