Intent
Our maths curriculum aims to promote fluency and mastery to all year groups and abilities. We use a fluid approach to teaching, where each learning objective begins with building and improving fluency and progresses into reasoning and problem solving.
We use the White Rose Hub material which provide Small Steps of progression for every area of maths. Every lesson has a PowerPoint packed full of models and images that support the learning. The accompanying worksheets provides an excellent balance from fluency though to Reasoning and Problem Solving. Also, available to every lesson is a video of the slide presentation to support the learning even further. The materials from the White Rose Hub are written by maths specialists which makes them current and detailed. All staff then use carefully selected additional age appropriate tasks and activities from a variety of resources and websites. This facilitates learning by promoting independence of thinking, resilience, reasoning and problem solving. These additional resources are located within 2 folders per year group, Challenge A and Challenge B. These 2 levels of additional challenge activities are then available to extend and challenge even further at the right challenge level for all pupils within the class.
At Crowan, we believe that all children should be given the opportunity to access Reasoning and Problem Solving at the right challenge level, enabling them to become confident mathematicians. In all year groups, strong images and models are used as well as manipulatives and real life maths activities. This all builds together to give the children a real sense of maths in the world and their lives.
Implementation
To progress the children’s knowledge and skills of basic number facts, skills and knowledge are practised every day in order for children to increase their fluency in these areas. Throughout Years 1 – 6 the children start with the White Rose Worksheets where the children work through from fluency to reasoning and problem solving. This system enables all children to work on the same learning but are scaffolded at each step. From teachers’ daily assessments, additional fluency tasks can be used. Whereas when children are ready they are able to access more challenging Problem Solving and Reasoning activities by directed to the correct folder to choose their next activity from. In some instances, problem solving activities are used in whole class situations where the children work collaboratively focusing on their resilience, teamwork and problem solving skills.
Mastery activities appear from the very beginning, on the White Rose Worksheets. When planning teachers use the White Rose Hub – Small steps, White Rose Hub Mastery Overviews as well as other websites. They design and select activities / tasks around this small steps planning. This gives the children access to a variety of tasks which are age appropriate and designed to stretch and challenge. Teachers use a variety of resources/manipulatives to teach maths. This includes bead strings, counters, Place Value cards, Place Value counters and grids, 100 squares, Base 10, Numicon and Cuisinaires.
Resources are used through the whole school to support learning and are available to children at all times in lessons. The use of multiple resources supports children in building real understanding of new and abstract concepts in maths which in turn enables them to manipulate number/concepts and solve problems. We ensure that variation, including models and images, occur in all lessons and through all year groups.
Real life maths links are made through all subjects and in our outside areas where maths understanding is strengthened by learning in this the outdoors.
The Teaching of Mathematics at Crowan
Mathematics is a core subject in the National Curriculum and we have adopted the White Rose Hub, Small Step Progression scheme of work to support our planning, monitoring and assessment of the pupils.
Within our increasingly global and technologically driven world, the ability of our young people to become champions of flexibility and the unfamiliar is crucial.
Our Mastery Flow Teaching Model (initially championed in mathematics from 2013) is spreading through other subjects. The model maps out the learning journey of a learning objective.
The desired outcome of the learning journey is mastery. We define mastery as: fluency with the unfamiliar.
Mathematical Vocabulary Support Document
The purpose of this Vocabulary Support Document is to identify the words and phrases that children need to understand and use if they are to make good progress in mathematics.
There are three main ways in which children’s failure to understand mathematical vocabulary may show itself which are, children do not respond to questions in lessons, they cannot do a task they are set and/or they do poorly in tests.
Their lack of response may be because: they do not understand the spoken or written instructions, such as ‘draw a line between…’, ‘ring…’ or ‘find two different ways to…’; they are not familiar with the mathematical vocabulary, that is, words such as ‘difference’, ‘subtract’, ‘divide’ or ‘product’; they may be confused about mathematical terms, such as ‘odd’ or ‘table’, which have different meanings in everyday English; they may be confused about other words, like ‘area’ or ‘divide’, which are used in everyday English and have similar, though more precise, meanings in mathematics. There are, then, practical reasons why children need to acquire appropriate vocabulary so that they can participate in the activities, lessons and tests that are part of classroom life.
There is, however, an even more important reason: mathematical language is crucial to children’s development of thinking. If children don’t have the vocabulary to talk about division, or perimeters, or numerical difference, they cannot make progress in understanding these areas of mathematical knowledge.
You may find this document particularly useful as a parent when supporting your child with their learning of mathematics.
