Mathematics
Mathematics
Intent
By the time they leave Northgate, we aim for our children to:
Be able to apply their mathematical knowledge and skills to real-life scenarios that they will encounter in life beyond school. They will be confident and competent problem-solvers and will demonstrate resilience when tackling any mathematical challenge.
Implementation
At Northgate, we follow the aims of the National Curriculum. These are to develop fluency in the fundamentals of mathematics, to reason mathematically and to solve problems by applying mathematical knowledge to a variety of different contexts.
Our Mathematics teaching aims to equip pupils with these skills by embedding varied fluency, reasoning and problem-solving into Maths lessons across the school, from Year 1 to Year 6. Pupils are taught strategies to develop accuracy and logical and systematic thinking, as well as being taught which methods are most efficient, once understanding is secure. Children are given autonomy in their learning Mathematics.
In addition to a daily Maths lesson, short Mastering Number sessions are taught across the week in EYFS and KS1. These focus on building children’s quick recall of basic number facts through the explicit teaching of mental methods and making connections between the number system.
Our approach also uses concrete manipulatives (such as dienes, multi-link cubes and place value counters), pictorial representations (pictures representing mathematical concepts, including bar models and part-whole models) and more abstract approaches (written calculations). This structured support, combined with our high expectations, ensures that children develop a deep conceptual understanding of the fundamentals of mathematics which they can then apply to a variety of contexts across the curriculum, in subjects such as Science, Computing and Design and Technology, as well as in real-life situations.
We aim to build our pupils’ resilience and problem-solving ability in Mathematics through explicit problem-solving lessons at least twice per half-term, to provide children with the opportunity to develop problem-solving skills and gain familiarity with tackling mathematical problems out of context. Children are encouraged to work in partners or part of a group to develop mathematical talk and use of mathematical vocabulary, which is consistently used and modelled by teachers and support staff across the school.
SCHOOL SNAPSHOT
NORTHGATE PRIMARY SCHOOL
A creative and innovative place of learning.
