Maths
Our Curriculum Intent for Maths
Mathematics is essential to everyday life, critical to science, technology and engineering, and necessary for financial literacy and most forms of employment. A high-quality mathematics education therefore provides a foundation for understanding the world, the ability to reason mathematically, an appreciation of the beauty and power of mathematics, and a sense of enjoyment and curiosity about the subject.
The national curriculum for mathematics aims to ensure that all pupils:
- Become fluent in the fundamentals of mathematics, including through varied and frequent practice with increasingly complex problems over time, so that pupils develop conceptual understanding and the ability to recall and apply knowledge rapidly and accurately.
- Reason mathematically by following a line of enquiry, conjecturing relationships and generalisations, and developing an argument, justification or proof using mathematical language
- Can solve problems by applying their mathematics to a variety of routine and non-routine problems with increasing sophistication, including breaking down problems into a series of simpler steps and persevering in seeking solutions.
Mathematics is an interconnected subject in which pupils need to be able to move fluently between representations of mathematical ideas. The programmes of study are, by necessity, organised into apparently distinct domains, but pupils should make rich connections across mathematical ideas to develop fluency, mathematical reasoning and competence in solving increasingly sophisticated problems. They should also apply their mathematical knowledge to science and other subjects. The expectation is that the majority of pupils will move through the programmes of study at broadly the same pace. However, decisions about when to progress should always be based on the security of pupils’ understanding and their readiness to progress to the next stage. Pupils who grasp concepts rapidly should be challenged through being offered rich and sophisticated problems before any acceleration through new content. Those who are not sufficiently fluent with earlier material should consolidate their understanding, including through additional practice, before moving on.
Teaching and Learning of Maths (Implementation)
At Pott Shrigley church school, children study mathematics daily covering a broad and balanced mathematical curriculum including elements of number, calculation, geometry, measures and statistics. Due to the interconnected nature of mathematics, at Pott Shrigley church school we aim to teach maths in a cross curricular manner as well as discretely to teach the practical application of mathematical skills. We focus not only on the mathematical methods but also focus on mathematical vocabulary and to use Maths Mastery to broaden and deepen mathematical understanding.
We aim for each child to be confident in each yearly objective and develop their ability to use this knowledge to develop a greater depth understanding to solve varied fluency problems as well as problem solving and reasoning questions.
We teach mixed ages classes and carefully match objectives and outcomes to ensure all children receive direct teaching from the class teacher daily and targeted support from high quality teaching assistants. This means we may move programmes of study to earlier or later in the year to ensure mathematical strands match across year groups (within a mixed age class). This has been carefully considered and planned to ensure the progression of skills in taught in the correct sequence.
We have a high proportion of SEND children so high-quality concrete and pictorial lessons/resources are key to ensure all children progress is line with their own abilities and potential. Targeted support and challenge is used in all classes to ensure children make good or satisfactory progress in mathematics.
Children may be taught in the year below their chorological age if they are working at this level. This is to ensure children succeed and progress on their own learning journey.
The intended impact of Maths teaching and learning at Pott Shrigley church school
Throughout each lesson formative assessment takes place and feedback is given to the children through verbal feedback, marking and next step tasks to ensure they are meeting the specific learning objective. Teacher’s then use this assessment to influence their planning and ensure they are providing a mathematics curriculum that will allow each child to progress. The teaching of maths is also monitored on a termly basis through annual book scrutinies, learning walks and lesson observations. Each term children from Year 1 and above complete a summative assessment to help them to develop their testing approach and demonstrate their understanding of the topics covered. In order to complete this assessment we use the white rose maths assessment tools and tests.
The expectation is that the majority of pupils will move through the programmes of study at broadly the same pace. However, decisions about when to progress should always be based on the security of pupils’ understanding and their readiness to progress to the next stage. Pupils who grasp concepts rapidly should be challenged through being offered rich and sophisticated problems before any acceleration through new content. Those who are not sufficiently fluent with earlier material should consolidate their understanding, including through additional practice, before moving on. We use the structure of our mixed age classes to ensure children are supported at whichever programme of study they are working at.
There is a detailed LTP available with clear progression for all year groups in a mixed age setting. This sets out end of year outcomes and objectives and details how each year group will be taught in a mixed age class.