Maths

Our Intent

At St Hilda’s Church of England VC Ampleforth, Primary School, we use the White Rose Maths schemes of work to deliver the National Curriculum for Mathematics.  White Rose maths breaks learning down into small, achievable steps that pupils build upon in order to become confident mathematicians. We use this scheme as a basis for our planning, tailoring it to suit the needs of our mixed age classes.

Click here to visit the White Rose website: https://whiterosemaths.com/

We create the foundation for maths in school in EYFS. We teach practical methods using concrete support, leading onto pictorial representation and then numerical presentation. We encourage children to play with numbers and use counting skills throughout the day in all areas of the classroom and outdoor area.

We intend that our pupils will:

• Master and become confident in fundamental Mathematical concepts
• Be able to quickly recall key mathematical facts, such as times tables and number bonds
• Develop a range of mental and written calculation strategies
• Be able to apply their mathematical knowledge to solve problems, including those with real-life contexts, by choosing the appropriate operations
• Will leave primary school with efficient and reliable written methods of calculation for each operation
• Understand the importance of mathematical skills in everyday life and how they may apply their skills in the future
• Develop an enjoyment of Mathematics
• Will show clear progression of mental maths skills and strategies over time.
• Have access to open-ended tasks, activities and good levels of challenge to ensure all children make at least good progress in maths.
• Make good progress and are able to evaluate their own learning.

Knowledge

Substantive
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.

Disciplinary

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.

Our Implementation

Our pupils are taught in mixed age classes.  We teach Maths in small, achievable steps to allow children to build their knowledge in a well-structured sequence that ensures success is possible for every child.

Mastering number:

• We use a variety of representations of number in maths lessons in order to build up children's understanding of the structure of number.
• Our pupils are given regular opportunities for problem solving, including collaborative paired or group work.
• Maths vocabulary is explicitly taught and is a feature of daily maths lessons.
• Pupils are encouraged to explain their Mathematical reasoning. They are provided with reasoning questions as part of daily maths lessons and are supported in their responses using sentence stems.
• We provide extension activities for able pupils in order to deepen their understanding.

Fluency:

• Our pupils access fluency work daily which supports, challenges and stretches different abilities and year groups. This includes daily times tables practice in Key Stage 2 and regular number of the day work in all Key Stages 1 and 2.
• We have a keen focus on subitising in EYFS, to build pupils early understanding and recognition of numbers within ten.

Applying maths:

• We have regular discussions with our pupils about why and how we are going to use our Maths skills in a ‘real-life’ context.
• We make use of the outdoor environment in EYFS to provide practical opportunities for mathematical activities.
• We will design and construct an engaging curriculum plan to allow children the opportunity to apply mathematical skills in all areas of the curriculum. 

Maths and Inclusion

Maths is taught to all pupils, regardless of ability or specific needs. Through our coherent maths curriculum and effective teaching, we provide learning opportunities that enable all pupils to make good progress. We make maths accessible to all pupils and ensure pupils with special needs, disabilities, EAL and more able succeed. As a collaboration, we have appropriate interventions to meet all pupil’s needs in
mathematics, such as Numicon.

Our Impact:

• Pupils draw upon their conceptual and procedural understanding in order to have a go at unfamiliar problems.
• Pupils discuss with the teacher and respond to questioning in their books in order to widen skills and vary their mathematical approach.
• Pupils are becoming more resilient during problem-solving activities. They are willing to ‘have a go’ and do not fear failure.
• Pupils make good progress in their recall of key mathematical facts.
• Pupils have good attitudes towards collaborative problem solving, and pupils enjoy discussing and testing the best way of solving problems.
• Pupils use practical strategies and equipment to help them solve problems.
• Pupils are able to discuss what their targets are in Maths.  

 Assessment, feedback and progression:

• Our pupils complete elicitation tasks prior to starting a unit of work, to allow teachers to gain an understanding of what pupils already know and tailor their learning to their targets.
• Pupils then complete an assessment at the end of a unit.
• Ongoing assessment takes place in each lesson and this informs the planning for the next lesson.
• Pupils have time to complete any corrections once their books have been marked and respond to teacher feedback.
• Each term pupil progress is measured using NFER standardised tests      

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