Mathematics 
Mathematics Mission Statement at Ley Top Primary School
Mathematics teaches us how to make sense of the world around us through developing a child’s ability to calculate, to reason and to solve problems. It enables children to understand and appreciate relationships and pattern in both number and space in their everyday lives. Through their growing knowledge and understanding, children learn to appreciate the contribution made by many cultures to the development and application of mathematics.
At Ley Top we aim to:
- promote enjoyment and enthusiasm for learning through practical activity, exploration and discussion.
- promote confidence and competence with numbers and the number system.
- develop the ability to solve problems through decision-making and reasoning in a range of contexts.
- develop a practical understanding of the ways in which information is gathered and presented.
- explore features of shape and space, and develop measuring skills in a range of contexts.
- understand the importance of mathematics in everyday life.
Introduction
At Ley Top we aim to ensure that our children have access to a high-quality mathematics curriculum that is both challenging and enjoyable. We want to develop our children into confident mathematicians who are not afraid to take risks. Children need opportunities to make rich connections across mathematical ideas to develop fluency, mathematical reasoning and competence in solving increasingly sophisticated problems. It is vital for our children to be able to see how mathematics is relevant to their world, and applicable to everyday life. We also aim to instil ‘lifelong learning’ and an understanding of how mathematics is something that the children will need as they move through their school life and into the world of employment.
Curriculum design
- Staff use White Rose Maths Schemes of Learning to assist their teaching and develop cohort specific teaching slides to meet the needs of their pupils. The SOL follows a mastery approach.
- Learning is broken down into small steps that build in progression and consider prior learning before new learning is introduced.
- Lessons will contain a combination of fluency, reasoning and problem solving all of which are taught and build on application of skills.
- The CPA (concrete-practical-abstract) model is used throughout school from foundation to Year 6 to support conceptual understanding.
- Opportunities for additional practice is provided outside the daily maths lesson, where appropriate.
Lesson structure
- Teachers plan slides (Powerpoint or Smart board slides) in line with White Rose Maths to support the delivery of instruction. These slides are adapted from the original materials to meet the needs of the children in the class.
- All teachers plan from the White Rose medium plans (currently found on Cornerstones), which allow time to focus on topics by teaching in blocked units. The order of the blocks is followed as presented.
- Sufficient time is spent on key concepts to ensure learning is developed and embedded before moving on.
- For the majority, the whole class is taught mathematics together. The learning needs of individual pupils are addressed through scaffolding and questioning. Appropriate intervention is given to provide the necessary support and challenge where needed. Where appropriate, individual children who are unable to access the curriculum will receive targeted QFT and be supported through individual targets using B-Squared.
- The lessons are broken down into ‘Watch me’, ‘Help me’ and ‘Show me’ sections to give the pupils the opportunity to practice and apply.
- Resources are used carefully to both enable and extend learning. Lessons may interchange between concrete manipulatives, pictorial representations and the abstract representation.
- Maths vocabulary should form part of every lesson, be visible on the working walls and it should be modelled in the correct way, in order to develop children’s oracy and reasoning skills.
- Stem sentences should be used where appropriate to develop pupil reasoning. These can be taken from the White Rose Maths materials or the NCETM PD materials.
- Formative assessment takes place during the lesson to identify and address pupil misconceptions. Live marking and verbal feedback is used to support this.
- There should be a clearly defined maths area/ working wall, with resources that can be easily accessed by the children in every class. The working walls should build the picture of learning and display representations, modelling and key vocabulary.
Maths Overview
Links to useful Maths sites: