Maths

Intent

At Ringwood Junior School our Mathematics curriculum will develop children that have a love and curiosity for learning Mathematics. We will foster the child’s ability to calculate, to reason and to solve problems in a range of contexts. In order to achieve this our children will learn to justify, explain and become fluent in all areas of Mathematics, whilst being confident and independent Mathematicians. We aim for all children to become creative and critical thinkers by providing opportunities for them to notice patterns, make links and draw connections. Therefore, our Mathematics curriculum is deliberately structured in a way that allows our children to make links with prior learning and build upon it in new concepts. We recognise the importance of allowing all children access to concrete materials and visual stimuli to support and deepen their understanding. This, in turn, will develop children’s resilience as they will approach mathematics with a range of tools and resources that they can use, if needed, to support their learning when faced with challenge. Alongside this, we will develop the children’s understanding and use of mathematical language through carefully written stem sentences. Finally, we will provide the children with opportunities to develop knowledge and skills that they can then transfer to life beyond education.

Implementation

Maths is taught daily.  The various concepts of maths are taught in blocks with opportunities to retrieve learning from previous . The concepts of mathematics are:

• Number and place value
• Addition and subtraction
• Multiplication and division
• Fractions, decimals and percentages
• Measurement
• Geometry
• Statistics
• Ratio and proportion (year 6 only)
• Algebra (year 6 only)

Although the concepts are taught in blocks, the inter-connectivity between the areas are strong and are brought together through problem solving activities.

Across the school, each maths lesson begins with an opportunity for children to retrieve long term learning (LTR) unrelated to the learning in that lesson.

The remainder of the lesson is spent learning about an element of the current concept starting with an element of short-term retrieval which links to the new learning in that lesson. The tasks are designed to meet the learning objective and always begin with fluency practice in order to check that children have conceptual and procedural knowledge to reasoning and problem solve.  The teaching and learning is supported through using concrete resources and pictorial representations. The reasoning / problem  solving helps the children to become critical thinkers and make links and draw connections.  Additional ‘Going Deeper’ tasks are available to all children and aim to further challenge their mathematical understanding.  These may include other concepts of maths within the new learning.

Teachers model and children are expected to use correct mathematical language when explaining their understanding.  A vocabulary progression document is used to support teachers with this and stem sentences are given to ensure a consistent approach.  These are dual coded to ensure all children can use the mathematical language.

In the lower school, discrete times tables lessons are taught and the children are given the opportunity to practise and become fluent in these through ‘Times tables challenges’. Children also have access to ‘Times Tables Rockstars’ – a fun, interactive website to help them recall their times tables both at home and in school.  Across the school, we also include one arithmetic lesson where the children are given the opportunity to practise number facts and operations.

Homework is set each week on ‘Mathletics’ – a website which provides activities aligned to each year group’s weekly objectives. The homework gives the children an opportunity to practice a skill learnt at school.

Some children will require additional support, in and out of lesson time. These children will be identified by formative assessment by the teachers. Booster groups are run by teachers and LSA’s to help children to progress. This can be in the form of pre-teaching or over-learning.

Children’s progress is monitored through their work in their books, targeted questioning and pupil conferencing by class teachers. NFER tests are used twice per year (at beginning of spring term and towards the end of summer term) for summative assessment.  These also inform teachers of gaps in understanding which is used to inform booster groups.

The subject is monitored through regular book looks, learning walks (by year leaders and maths leader), pupil conferencing and test paper analysis.

Impact

As a result of our broad mathematics curriculum, children will develop conceptual and procedural understanding of all areas of maths and be able to explain this using the correct mathematical vocabulary.  Children will become fluent mathematicians underpinned by their understanding of number facts and exposure to a range of efficient methods.  This in turn will enable children to make independent choices in their maths lessons so that they feel confident and successful mathematicians.  Due to carefully designed long term planning, children will be able to retrieve prior learning within new mathematical concepts.  Children will develop an enjoyment for maths through making links to maths in the wider world by problem solving in different contexts.