At Saint Patrick’s Catholic Primary School, we aim to create an environment in which each individual has the opportunity to thrive supported by values of Christ firmly built into our everyday foundations. Education, welfare and wellbeing are at the heart of everything we do. Above all else, we want to foster a strong belief in all our children that they can succeed in all they do, no matter what. Working with all school parties, we wish to nurture each child’s potential and foster high aspirations. It is essential that we give them the tool kit needed to achieve their goals regardless of background or starting points.

At Saint Patrick’s Catholic Primary School, children enjoy their learning in maths and take every opportunity to learn, love and grow throughout their journey from Nursery to Year 6.

Intent

The National Curriculum for maths aims to ensure that all pupils:

• become fluent in the fundamentals of mathematics, including through varied and frequent practice with increasingly complex problems over time, so that pupils develop conceptual understanding and the ability to recall and apply knowledge rapidly and accurately.
• reason mathematically by following a line of enquiry, conjecturing relationships and generalisations, and developing an argument, justification or proof using mathematical language
• can solve problems by applying their mathematics to a variety of routine and non - routine problems with increasing sophistication, including breaking down problems into a series of simpler steps and persevering in seeking solutions.
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At Saint Patrick's, we believe that, through the study of maths, children will have 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. Through our curriculum, we aim to ensure that our children are exposed to a creative and enriched maths curriculum as we feel maths is essential to everyday life, critical to science, technology and engineering, and necessary for financial literacy and most forms of employment. Throughout EYFS, children are given opportunities to develop and improve their skills in counting, understanding and using numbers, calculating simple addition and subtraction problems; and to describe shapes, spaces, and measures.

In KS1, the principal focus of mathematics teaching is to ensure that pupils develop confidence and mental fluency with whole numbers, counting and place value. This involves working with numerals, words and the four operations, including with practical resources (for example, concrete objects and measuring tools). At this stage, pupils develop their ability to recognise, describe, draw, compare and sort different shapes and use the related vocabulary. Teaching at Saint Patrick's involves using a range of measures to describe and compare different quantities such as length, mass, capacity/volume, time and money. By the end of year 2, pupils should know the number bonds to 20 and be precise in using and understanding place value. An emphasis on practice at this early stage will aid fluency. Pupils should read and spell mathematical vocabulary, at a level consistent with their increasing word reading and spelling knowledge at key stage 1.

In Lower KS2, the principal focus of mathematics teaching is to ensure that pupils become increasingly fluent with whole numbers and the four operations, including number facts and the concept of place value. This should ensure that pupils develop efficient written and mental methods and perform calculations accurately with increasingly large whole numbers. At this stage, pupils should develop their ability to solve a range of problems, including with simple fractions and decimal place value. Teaching should also ensure that pupils draw with increasing accuracy and develop mathematical reasoning so they can analyse shapes and their properties, and confidently describe the relationships between them. It should ensure that they can use measuring instruments with accuracy and make connections between measure and number. By the end of year 4, pupils should have memorised their multiplication tables up to and including the 12 multiplication table and show precision and fluency in their work. Pupils should read and spell mathematical vocabulary correctly and confidently, using their growing word reading knowledge and their knowledge of spelling.

In upper KS2, the principal focus of mathematics teaching is to ensure that pupils extend their understanding of the number system and place value to include larger integers. This should develop the connections that pupils make between multiplication and division with fractions, decimals, percentages and ratio. At this stage, pupils should develop their ability to solve a wider range of problems, including increasingly complex properties of numbers and arithmetic, and problems demanding efficient written and mental methods of calculation. With this foundation in arithmetic, pupils are introduced to the language of algebra as a means for solving a variety of problems. Teaching in geometry and measures should consolidate and extend knowledge developed in number. Teaching should also ensure that pupils classify shapes with increasingly complex geometric properties and that they learn the vocabulary they need to describe them. By the end of year 6, pupils should be fluent in written methods for all four operations, including long multiplication and division, and in working with fractions, decimals and percentages. Pupils should read, spell and pronounce mathematical vocabulary correctly.

Our curriculum aims to ensure that pupils:

• are exposed to concepts and procedures that they have already learned and allow them to apply such skills to their current learning and their future learning. In turn, this will ensure continuity and progression in the teaching of Maths and will support pupils in mastering and deepening learning across all key stages. 

• have opportunities to solve practical everyday problems which will assist with their learning across the whole curriculum through the use of mathematical reasoning and problem solving.

• engage in rapid recall to increasing their maths confidence by taking time with new materials (WRM) so that mathematical knowledge becomes deeply embedded.

• access flexible and differentiated maths activities so that gaps in their knowledge are addressed and secured in order to move onto new content, with assessment used to identify when they have reached the understanding they need to move on to new or more complex maths.

• who are behind age-related expectations, are given opportunities to learn the mathematical knowledge and skills they need to catch up.

• are able to build progression of skills and vocabulary through the consistent delivery of explicit, discrete (10 minute daily maths challenge and cross curricular links in maths) and independent maths.

The curriculum at Saint Patrick’s is organised through the teaching of different topics throughout the year. The topics are grouped into mathematical strands taken from the National Curriculum (Number and Place Value, Addition and Subtraction, Multiplication and Division, Measurement, Fractions, Geometry – Position and Direction, Geometry – Properties of Shape, Ratio and Proportion, Statistics and Algebra) where possible, a strand will be taught across the school at the same time enabling knowledge, skills and resources to be shared and developed as well as monitoring and assessment of the subject to be undertaken.

Our curriculum is an interconnected subject in which pupils need to be able to move fluently between representations of mathematical ideas. The curriculum, by necessity, is organised into apparently distinct domains, but pupils should make rich connections across mathematical ideas to develop fluency, mathematical reasoning and competence in solving increasingly sophisticated problems. They should also apply their mathematical knowledge to science and other subjects.

Implementation

The content and principles underpinning the 2014 Mathematics curriculum and the Maths curriculum at Saint Patrick's ensures that children develop a deep, conceptual understanding of mathematical concepts. These principles and features steer the way in which our curriculum is implemented:

• Retention is developed through daily flashback four activities

• Children are exposed to daily arithmetic practise 

• Teachers reinforce an expectation that all children are capable of achieving high standards in Mathematics

• New concepts are introduced through concrete, pictorial and symbolic representations. Children progress through these stages at their own pace and the appropriate models and images are provided to support learning

• Teachers use the White Rose scheme of learning to support in planning the maths curriculum

• There is a clear progression to written calculation policy and mental strategies progression chart that ensures progression year on year

• Practice and consolidation play a central role. Children are given the opportunity to practice skills within a variety of contexts so that they develop a strong varied fluency

• Play and practical exploration are key to developing a conceptual understanding in maths and in engaging children in enjoyment of maths

• Problem solving activities are interwoven into the teaching of mathematics to ensure children have a wealth of opportunities to apply their knowledge, understanding and skills

• Children are taught to use models and images to explore and explain or reason mathematical concepts

• Teachers use assessment for learning throughout the teaching cycle to identify conceptual and procedural knowledge. This assessment information is used to inform teaching and identify quickly those children who require intervention

• Maths is given a high profile and is celebrated through regular theme days

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