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“It’s about making numeracy friendly and approachable”: Boosting number confidence in Nottingham

25 Sep 2026

The theme of this year’s Number Confidence Week is “Count On Your Community” and when it comes to the power of communities, Numeracy Champions are a great example.

Numeracy Champions are people within organisations who help colleagues, customers and communities feel better about everyday maths, the benefits of which can be life changing.

Their training is funded by National Numeracy’s amazing partners, whose joint goal is to help improve the numeracy of the nation. Since it began in 2020, the programme has trained over 4,000 people!

Henry Adefolaju, Community Engager at Nottingham’s Open Arms Organisation – a Community Interest Company – is a Numeracy Champion, whose training was funded by National Numeracy partner Experian after he heard about the programme via the Nottingham Financial Resilience Partnership.

Henry told National Numeracy how he is helping to engage his local community with numeracy by incorporating some of what he learned into the Open Arms Elders’ Circle, one of several projects run by the organisation, aimed at building community cohesion.

“The Elders’ Circle is for people aged 55 and above and currently we have around 15 members,” explains Henry. “Some people suffer from loneliness, where they don’t really go anywhere, they just sit at home indoors, so even if it’s once a week, they want to communicate and connect with people of the same age.”

“After training as a Numeracy Champion I started thinking: ‘How can I make use of this?’ We have lots of different number-themed games, where you have to try and score points, so you need to add up as you go along, but it’s also possible to lose points, in which case you need to subtract as well. It’s a fun, friendly way of building number confidence.”

Three people holding a model of a house and smiling

Looking at maths in a different way

Many people have bad memories of maths from school days, but Henry says the Numeracy Champion training has given him ideas on making the subject more accessible. 

“The training has helped me see how I can remodel maths to present it to people in another way,” he says. “If I was not a Numeracy Champion, I might not have implemented numeracy into the programme at all.”

“We don’t want to give people a pen and paper and ask them to start writing as though they’re in a classroom. We also want to give people freedom, because they might not want to do anything with numbers, so there is a choice of activities.”

“It’s about making numeracy friendly and approachable, but if people don't feel comfortable doing it, they can do something else instead.”

A person smiling and sitting at a table with numbered cards on it

A numeracy network for people to share ideas

Numeracy Champions are also invited to online forums where they can share experiences and ideas, and Henry says this is particularly useful.

“I think the forums are great,” he says. “They are a great way to share ideas with other Numeracy Champions. If somebody says: ‘This is what we did…', I might say: ‘OK, wow, I will try that.’”

Open Arms also incorporates a food bank, and Henry says numeracy plays a vital role.

“We need to calculate how to distribute the food between the number of beneficiaries,” he explains. “It’s not equal – for example, we need to pack more food for a family with two adults and three children than for one adult.”

“Also, sometimes we have surplus, so we keep that aside for a time when we might have less food delivered, so we can make up the food parcels using the surplus that we’ve saved from earlier.”

Two people at a table with numbered cards on it

The benefits of being a Numeracy Champion, for you and your community

Training Numeracy Champions across the UK has benefits that reach far into communities. While Champions don’t teach maths, they do support people to take the first step to improving their numeracy, signposting to resources and giving encouragement. It’s a growing network and one Henry is proud to be part of.

“I would recommend becoming a Numeracy Champion,” he smiles. “Then I would ask: ‘Why do you want to do it?’ Because you could do it and not make use of it.

“Someone might want to boost their mathematics or find a job or support others, which is good. I would definitely say it is worth it, go for it!

“At Open Arms, we get a ‘thank you’ every time for what we are doing, which shows people really appreciate it. We get a 'thank you' and that is more than enough for me.”

A person filling in a maths crossword puzzle

Our pioneering partners help us drive positive change across the UK and together we are supporting more people than ever to improve their numeracy and build brighter futures.

Working together brings a host of strategic benefits. To learn more about how our work can support your organisation’s charitable goals please email partnerships@nationalnumeracy.org.uk 

Are you interested in signing your organisation up for Numeracy Champion training?

Some of our largest projects to date include working with Health Education England, Local Authorities, as part of the Multiply initiative, and our Every Londoner Counts project with the Lord Mayor’s Appeal.

Find out more here or email programmes@nationalnumeracy.org.uk 

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