Maths

Our School Vision for Maths

At SS Peter and Paul, we aim to inspire children to develop a love of maths and, as a staff team, we work closely together to promote curiosity and enthusiasm for the subject from Foundation Stage to Year 6 – and beyond.

Intent

The 2014 National Curriculum for Maths aims to ensure that all children:

• Become fluent in the fundamentals of Mathematics
• Are able to reason mathematically
• Can solve problems by applying their Mathematics

At SS Peter & Paul, we take a Mastery approach to Mathematics. This makes certain that the fundamental principles underpinning the 2014 Mathematics curriculum are being explored in depth to provide children with a rich and secure mathematical understanding and a concrete foundation for future learning. We are committed to ensuring that children recognise the importance of Maths in the wider world and that they are able to use their mathematical skills and knowledge confidently in a range of real-life contexts. Our children are encouraged to work together to reason and justify their ideas and feel supported to challenge themselves.

At the heart of a mastery approach is the belief that every child can achieve. At SS Peter and Paul, we believe that nurturing this growth-mindset approach equips children for the skills they need to embrace life’s opportunities.

Implementation

At SS Peter and Paul, we have adopted the teaching for Mastery approach as we believe this gives all children the opportunity to succeed. We use whole class teaching that encourages children to master a concept before moving onto the next step. Our lessons are designed to break down the National Curriculum objectives into smaller steps in learning. To do this we use White Rose Maths as the foundations to ensure that these steps are sequenced and is supplemented by other resources (Nrich, IseeReasoning, NCETM, Power Maths and Number Sense) to give children fluency practise and reasoning & problem solving opportunities that have carefully implemented the 5 ‘Big Ideas' of Mastery.

Impact

Our school has a supportive ethos and our approaches support the children in developing their collaborative and independent skills, as well as empathy and the need to recognise the achievement of others. Children can underperform in Mathematics because they think they can’t do it or are not naturally good at it. Our growth-mindset approach to Maths addresses these preconceptions by ensuring that all children experience challenge and success in Mathematics. Regular and ongoing assessment informs teaching, as well as intervention, to support and enable the success of each child. These factors ensure that we are able to maintain high standards, with achievement at the end of KS2 above the national average and a high proportion of children demonstrating greater depth, at the end of each phase.