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    Maths

    Rationale

    The study of Maths is essential to everyday life, critical to science, technology and engineering, and necessary for financial literacy and most forms of employment. A high-quality mathematics education provides a foundation for understanding the world, the ability to reason mathematically, an appreciation of the beauty and power of mathematics, and a sense of enjoyment and curiosity about the subject.

    The teaching of Maths at Thorpe Cof E Primary School, will be based on the national curriculum programme of study and shaped by our intent, implementation and impact aims.

    Intent  

    When teaching mathematics at Thorpe, we intend to

    • provide a curriculum which caters for the needs of all individuals.
    • incorporate sustained levels of challenge through varied and high-quality activities with a focus on fluency, reasoning and problem solving.
    • explore maths in depth, using mathematical vocabulary to reason and explain.
    • use a wide range of mathematical resources. Teaching pupils to show their workings in a concrete fashion, before establishing ways of pictorially and formally representing their understanding.
    • Encourage pupils to explain their choice of methods and develop their mathematical reasoning skills.
    • Encourage resilience and acceptance that struggle is often a necessary step in learning. 

    Implementation  

    We implement our approach through high quality teaching delivering appropriately challenging work for all individuals. To support us we have a range of mathematical resources in classrooms. We also use a range of planning resources including those provided by the White Rose Hub, NCETM and NRICH. We continuously strive to better ourselves and frequently share ideas that have been particularly effective both within our staff and our local partnership of schools. We also take part in training opportunities provided both locally and by the White rose Maths Hub. 

    Early Years Foundation Stage.

    The teaching of Maths is named as a ‘Specific’ area as part of the Early Years Foundation Stage Curriculum. The two Early Learning Goals for Maths are Number and Numerical patterns

    We give all children the opportunity to explore different aspects of number, shape, space and measures and learn new concepts using a range of resources. The adults model the use of these resources and the appropriate mathematical language as they support the children. We aim to ensure that all children develop firm mathematical foundations in a way that is engaging, and appropriate for their age.

    The children work towards achieving the early learning goals at the end of their Reception year across the subjects. Achievement will be assessed within the context of the Early Years Foundation Stage Profile.

    Impact  

    Through our teaching, we continuously monitor pupils’ progress against expected attainment for their age. We complete end of block, where appropriate, and end of term assessments and use these to compile formative assessment checklists. These in turn inform our discussions during termly Pupil Progress Meetings and are used to update our summative school tracker (Insight tracking) termly. The main purpose of all assessment is to ensure that we are providing excellent provision for every child. We identify gaps in understanding and work hard to address them.  

    SEN, Gifted and Talented, Vulnerable Groups

    At our school we teach Maths to all children, whatever their ability and individual needs. Maths forms part of the school’s curriculum policy to provide a broad and balanced education to all children. Through our Maths teaching we provide learning opportunities that enable all pupils to make good progress. We take all reasonable steps to meet the needs of those pupils with special educational needs, those with disabilities, those with special gifts and talents, and those learning English as an additional language (EAL). For further details see separate policies: Special Educational Needs.

    Health and Safety and Safeguarding

    Maths lessons follow the school guidelines for health and safety and the safeguarding of all pupils.

    Monitoring and review

    We have an identified Maths governor who is invited to meet with the subject leader annually to discuss SATs analysis, Teaching and Learning and subject developments. The Maths governor and subject leader jointly report their feedback to the Governors' Children’s Learning Committee.

    Monitoring of the standards of children’s work and of the quality of teaching and learning in Maths is the responsibility of the Headteacher, Governors and subject leader through lesson observations, learning walks and work scrutiny. The work of the subject leader also involves supporting colleagues in their teaching, signposting to training, being informed about current developments in the subject, and providing a strategic lead and direction for Maths in the school. The subject leader gives the Head and Governors an annual report, revised policy and action plan, in which they evaluate strengths and weaknesses in the subject, and indicate areas for further improvement.

    Other Information

    At Thorpe, we use the White Rose Scheme of work as the basis for our planning. Each class has a daily maths lesson following the small steps progression from this document. In addition to this we teach Number facts in KS1 using the Mastering Number programme and Times Tables in KS2. These are both taught in additional sessions.

    We work with parents through interactive workshops, parents' evenings and 1:1 meetings, when needed, to ensure they are confident to support their children with home learning.

    Children have access to Times Tables Rock Stars to practice their times tables at home and school and the Maths Shed website to support home learning.