Does being good at reading help with times tables?

Times tables look like a math problem, so struggles with them are assumed to have a math cause. But because of how they're stored in the brain, language ability is one of the strongest predictors of how quickly — and how reliably — a child acquires them.

What the research says

Research published by the Chartered College of Teaching (Guy, Cragg & Gilmore, 2025) identifies a consistent finding that doesn’t match most parents’ intuitions: learning multiplication facts requires language skills — not just mathematical ones.

The reason is structural. Times tables are stored in long-term memory as verbal sequences — phonological patterns, not numerical relationships. Learning them is more similar to learning the words of a song than to learning how addition works. As a result, the same skills that predict reading acquisition — phonological awareness, verbal working memory, language processing — also predict how efficiently a child acquires times table facts.

The implication cuts both ways. A child who struggles with times tables despite being a confident reader almost certainly has a practice problem, not a cognitive one — the verbal machinery is in place; the input (retrieval practice) is insufficient. A child who struggles with both reading and times tables may have underlying phonological or language-processing differences that explain both difficulties, and may benefit from different kinds of support than simply more drilling.

The additional finding from Dotan & Zviran-Ginat (2022): even children with strong language skills can be tripped up by interference — when similar-sounding facts are introduced together, they compete with each other in verbal memory, regardless of general language ability.

What this means in practice

A struggles-with-tables, strong-reader child is a different case from a struggles-with-tables, struggles-with-reading child. The first needs better practice. The second may need assessment and a different approach.

Try this

• If your child is a strong reader but struggles with tables, focus on retrieval frequency and spacing — not on explanation or understanding.
• If your child struggles with both reading and tables, consider whether a language or phonological assessment might be relevant.
• Ask your child to say table facts out loud — this engages the phonological system most directly and gives you information about how easily verbal retrieval is working.

Last reviewed: 2026-08-01