At Templefield Lower School, we believe that the development of mathematics skills and knowledge are vital, not only for children to succeed at school, but also to become successful and resilient adults. Being fluent with numbers, understanding patterns and using logic and problem solving skills are all essential parts of everyday life and help us to understand and change the world around us. We aim for all children to leave us as competent and confident ‘masters’ of maths, with deep conceptual and procedural knowledge and an enjoyment of the challenges that mathematics provides. We believe that every child can do maths and want our children to leave us as independent, reflective thinkers, whose skills not only liberate them in maths but also support them across the whole curriculum. We ensure that teachers have good subject knowledge through continuing professional development.
Core Aims in Mathematics
To offer a curriculum that allows children to at least meet the age related expectations of the National Curriculum
To allow pupils to see how mathematics is relevant to their everyday life
To provide opportunities for pupils to use and apply their mathematics skills outside of discrete maths teaching time in real life contexts
To promote a positive attitude towards mathematics and to enable pupils to develop their confidence in the subject and a motivation to succeed
To ensure that all children achieve to their highest potential in mathematics and that all pupils are challenged
To ensure we deliver a robust maths curriculum, we follow the long term plans based on White Rose guidance to sequence our learning and to ensure the full coverage of the maths curriculum and skills that our children need to learn for each year group.
The long term plan interweaves prior content with new concepts, this practice and consolidation helps children to grasp the links between topics and to understand them more deeply. Our teachers are proficient in ensuring that mathematical skills are embedded and will focus on a skill for longer before moving on if this is needed for the children in their class. In addition, they will consistently use Assessment for Learning opportunities to inform next steps. This means that the consolidation weeks that are scheduled are used wisely to revisit any misconceptions, link learning and recap knowledge already taught. This also allows us to address misconceptions or gaps that children may have so that we can fill the gaps so that children can catch up with their peers quickly.
Maths in EYFS and Year 1
In pre-school, children are exposed to number and shape, space and measures through a wide variety of songs, videos, stories and games. Children at this age are predominantly developing fluency skills in counting and an early understanding of the concept of numbers and where maths appears in their environment.
In Reception, children focus on a number a week, building on prior learning, and follow the mastering number programme, supported by the Enigma Maths Hub. This allows in-depth exploration of the concept of each number, including different ways it can be represented, where it sits in the sequence of numbers and how it can be changed. Manipulatives used within whole class teaching are available for children to access during child initiated play so that they are able to apply their knowledge and practise mathematical skills. This means that our younger children have a solid foundation, particularly in number to build upon as they move into Key Stage 1.
In Year 1 children spend a significant amount of time on number and place value. They use a range of manipulatives to help further develop a strong sense of the number system building on skills and knowledge from the Early Years. Research into the approach of using concrete apparatus, pictorial representation and then moving on to the abstract (CPA approach) suggests that this is a highly effective way to teach as it develops a deep and sustainable understanding of number. This is important for children to be able to confidently use numbers in different ways. Year 1 also re-visits number over the course of the year, unlike the other year groups, as this is broken down into more manageable stages across the year. This helps ensure that skills are deeply embedded and built upon over time. In addition to the daily maths lessons, the Mastering number programme is also being used in year 1 and 2, to further develop fluency.
We believe in the pedagogy behind using the concrete, pictorial and abstract approach in our mathematics teaching because it develops a deep and sustainable understanding of maths for our children. Our children regularly use manipulatives in class to aid them to apply their knowledge and skills. This then means that they can model and imagine these manipulatives and in turn they can move on to the next developmental stage of drawing the pictorial representation or ‘jotting’ to help them solve problems with increasing independence, speed and fluency. Once children are confident in using manipulatives and applying this to the pictorial representation we move onto using written number so that the children can make connections and have a greater understanding of number.
Planning:
Lessons are planned and sequenced so that new knowledge and skills build on what has been taught before. Teachers use the White Rose Maths Hub materials, Termly Overview and Schemes of work to guide and support their planning alongside national curriculum objectives. Staff also refer to the Calculation Policy when teaching formal methods, understanding that sometimes children find their own efficient methods along the way. As part of this process, teachers need to plan the following for mathematics lesson.
Precise questioning to test conceptual and procedural knowledge.
All of the blocks that we cover in each year group (FS - 4) are progressively ordered ensuring that some elements are learnt before others e.g. place value needs to be understood before children learn methods of addition and subtraction.
We have an emphasis on number skills that need to be carefully ordered, while other areas of maths such as shape and statistics don’t depend on each other and their placement in the year is not crucial for future learning. This flexibility allows us to make the most of any cross-curricular opportunities, where ‘real life’ problems and reasoning can enable enrichment across the curriculum, for example, linking Statistics and Data Handling with science investigations and results.
The ‘small step’ approach that WRM provides means that topics are broken down into smaller parts that are built upon. This provides the level of flexibility that our teachers needs to meet the requirements of the children in their class. The small steps allow opportunities to build upon the children’s prior knowledge to develop new skills resulting in a cumulative curriculum
At Templefield we employ a variety of teaching styles and opportunities for children to learn and develop their Mathematical skills and competencies, both individually and collaboratively. The main aim of all lessons is to develop children’s knowledge, understanding and skills, applying these to a variety of contexts. One of the key elements in lessons throughout the school should be on developing the children’s mental calculation strategies alongside developing the children’s written calculation strategies as laid out in the Written Calculation Policies for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.
Through the use of talk partners, group work and whole class discussion, we are developing the children’s oral confidence by encouraging them to answer all questions in Maths lessons in full sentences so that they can make connections between concepts which in turn helps children to retain knowledge
Our pupils are encouraged to physically represent mathematical concepts. Objects and pictures are used to demonstrate and visualise abstract ideas, alongside numbers and symbols.
When children are working independently, teachers and TA’s will be supporting children to address misconceptions or those that need to be moved on sooner. These children are identified through as much 'live' marking as possible. As children complete answers the children’s work is marked and if their answers are incorrect they will attempt to correct it in their purple pen.
If a child is still struggling to understand a skill this is where we will provide additional support in class
Verbal feedback is given to all children throughout the lesson which is in line with our schools feedback policy
Those children that are confident in using strategies to practice the skill and have proven that they understand the knowledge part of the lesson can be moved onto the application phase sooner to give them more opportunities to develop their reasoning skills.
Regular plenaries are used within lessons to address any misconceptions and if needed lessons are adapted throughout to meet the needs of all pupils. Where appropriate
Sequences of lessons are adapted and teachers are encouraged to either slow down and take more time on a topic by breaking it down into smaller steps to allow children to consolidate their knowledge or fill gaps. Equally if we find that children are confident on a certain topic, teachers are again encouraged to adapt their sequences of lessons to allow for children to be moved on with purpose so children are active learners who are always developing their knowledge and skills to allow for them to meet the national expectations for their end of year targets (or their personal targets if working below the expected level).
Through our teaching and assessment of Maths there is both immediate and long term impact. In EYFS, the children are confident to talk about their Maths learning, can verbally explain their reasoning and can hold a coherent conversation with their peers or adults about their learning. The children have a clear enjoyment of Maths and enjoy seeing the numbers come to life each lesson. This confidence of Maths and love of learning is then nurtured and developed as the children progress through the school.
Our delivery of Maths at KS1 and KS2 allows children to be confident in lessons and can be seen to use appropriate methods and strategies (such as manipulatives, pictorial and written methods) independently. This is reflected in the children’s Maths books where evidence of the CPA approach can be seen. This then feeds into their reasoning tasks which shows when the children have mastered the skills and knowledge taught within lessons.
When considering our long term impact of teaching and learning we focus on both end of year targets as well as their end of key stage targets. We strive for our children to reach age expectations at the end of their current academic year as well as their key stage. This includes the end of KS1 statutory assessments as well as the year 4 multiplication check (supported by the use of TT Rockstars). We also think forward to ensuring that our children are well prepared for the upper key stage 2 Maths curriculum.
Attainment in Maths continues to be above the LA and national in July 2022
End of EYFSP results
86% of pupils met the expected standard in Maths (National - 75.9% / LA 79% )
End of Key Stage 1 attainment
74% of pupils met the expected standard in maths, compared to 68% nationally (LA 68%).
25% of pupils met the higher standard in maths, compared to 15% nationally (LA 15% ).