Maths
At Kingsmead Primary, we follow the Maths Mastery philosophy which enables all children to access the mathematical skills and knowledge that they will use every day throughout their lives. We believe mathematical fluency is key to ensuring children can reason and problem solve mathematically. To ensure children can link what they learn in school to their everyday life, we ensure children have access to concrete resources, pictorial representations and real-life hooks and activities.
We follow the White Rose v3 small steps, primarily resourced using Power Maths materials, ensuring consistency across the school. We also supplement this with other high-quality resources to ensure challenge and breadth for our learners.
Our intent is for our children to have a curious and confident attitude towards maths enabling fluent, creative and flexible thinking, a deep understanding and eloquent reasoning.
The National Curriculum aims to ensure that all children:
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
Children across school have daily maths lessons following a mastery lesson structure. These lessons involve a fluency starter (to revisit and embed number facts), a real-life problem (to engage learning for that session), collaborative thinking time (involving working cooperatively with concrete resources to share ideas), independent practice (in their Power Maths books or Maths Journal) and a reflect activity (a chance to reflect and consolidate learning). Deeper understanding is evidenced by problem solving and reasoning.
Additional daily Mastering Number lessons are completed by learners in EYFS (Mastering Number resources) and KS1 (Fluency Bee resources). LKS2 learners complete additional times tables lessons on top of that covered in their usual maths lessons. Children in KS2 have daily opportunities to revisit previously learnt number facts.
Children in years 1 and 2 have access to Numbots - a programme that compliments learning in school and focuses on securing any gaps in knowledge, before moving them onto the next challenge.
How are children assessed in Maths?
Teachers assess children informally every day and adapt their teaching to suit the needs of the children in their class as required. Children also complete quizzes at the end of each unit and school term. This enables any misconceptions or gaps to be addressed quickly. Children in Year 4 complete their Multiplication Check in the summer term.
What happens if my child struggles and finds it hard?
- maths is broken down into small-steps, which build on prior learning, and are mastered before moving on
- children who have not mastered a step are identified quickly to ensure they keep up, not catch up
- children who need additional support receive it through targeted questions, additional concrete resources, quick intervention, pre and post-coach sessions
- this hands on and visual approach supports the learning of all children, including those with Special Education Needs (SEND), English as an Additional Language (EAL) and Disadvantaged Pupils (Pupil Premium)
What about if my child is showing secure understanding, how are they challenged?
- the mastery approach means children have the opportunity to apply their skills and knowledge at a deeper level
- children have the opportunity to independently and confidently complete problems of increased complexity, deduction and reasoning
- children are required to ensuring they have an efficient and logical approach and can explain their identified method answers eloquently, using mathematical language
- children complete sophisticated reasoning and problem solving challenges which require children to manipulate mathematical knowledge from different areas of mathematics.
The class work together on the same small step whilst at the same time challenging and supporting children to gain depth of understanding and proficiency.
In all years, children work on increasing fluency and efficiency in their mathematics. They are always expected to use the correct mathematical terminology when speaking or writing.
In EYFS
The first few years of a child’s life are especially important for mathematics development. We develop firm mathematical foundations in a way that is engaging, and appropriate for their age. There are six key areas of early mathematics learning - Cardinality and Counting, Comparison, Composition, pattern, Shape and space and measure - which collectively provide a platform for everything children will encounter as they progress through their maths learning at primary school, and beyond.
In EYFS, there is also a strong focus on Number, ensuring children have a solid conceptual understanding of the numbers 1-10 and then the teen numbers. EYFS mathematics is addressed through a combination of adult-led White Rose Maths activities, small group activities, independent activities and child-led play. Through the week, each day has a different focus, including: discover, share, thinking together, independent practice and reflect.
Year 1: “I like it because I use my sticks and dots”
Year 2: “Numbots helps me and it is fun”
Year 5: “When I lay my work out neatly it makes it easier to understand”
Year 6: “I’m proud of my bar models, they help with the worded questions”
In Key Stage 1…
Year 1 children build on the EYFS knowledge and develop confidence and mental fluency with whole numbers, counting and place value. They use practical resources to aid their learning and understanding when working with numerals, words and the 4 operations (+, - , x and ÷ ) This ensures everyone is on the same page and all children have the foundation knowledge to support further learning.
By the end of Year 2, pupils should be confident with their understanding number bonds to 100. They develop strategies for all four operations when using two-digit numbers. Children should also be confident to count in 2s, 3s and 5s, forward and backwards, from any number. Children will begin to recall times tables facts for 2, 5 and 10..
In Lower Key Stage 2
…learners build on their previous learning of whole numbers and the 4 operations developing a deeper understanding of number facts and the concept of place value. Children develop efficient written and mental methods and apply these to a range of problems including basic ones involving fractions and decimals. Children are able to use measuring instruments more accurately and make connections between measurement and number.
By the end of Year 4, children should have learnt their times tables (up to 12x12) fluently.
In Upper Key Stage 2
… children build on their previous learning and extend their understanding of number and place value to include large integers (up to 10,000,000). They develop their ability and understanding of links between multiplication and division with fractions, decimals, percentages and ratio.
When problem solving, children approach increasingly complex problems with multiple steps and are expected to do so using efficient strategies. Children’s written methods for the four operations should be fluent and include fractions, decimals and percentages.
What will we be able to see?
Children know and remember more in Mathematics as evidenced in their spoken and written work. They are able to recall prior knowledge and number facts and apply them confidently to a range of unknown and real-life contexts.
How will the children display their learning?
Children will display their work using concrete resources and in their Power Maths books and Maths Journals.
What will the children have achieved?
- National Curriculum aims, but as importantly, have developed into curious, engaged and confident mathematicians
- confidence and resilience to apply mathematical knowledge and skills to new and real-life problems.
- eloquence and understanding, being able to explain how they got to answer using mathematical vocabulary, concrete objects or pictorial representations.
- strong and secure sense of number due to our Mastering Number program and continuous recap of number facts.
Year 3: “My favourite part is when we sit on the carpet and work it out together”
Year 4: “I like it when there are lots of different ways to do a calculation”
If you were to walk into a Mathematics lesson at Kingsmead you would see:
flexible, resilient and engaged learners who collaborate and use mathematical vocabulary in their reasoning
children both supported (with concrete and pictorial resources), and challenged (through problem solving and reasoning questions)
children who can make connections, with prior knowledge and between their in school mathematics and real-life contexts.