Maths at St Benedict’s
Intent
Our St Benedict’s curriculum is designed with the intent to maximise the potential of all of our pupils; intellectually, socially, morally, emotionally and culturally. We take every opportunity to encourage a love for learning within all of our pupils, based around a resilience for learning and achieving greatness. Most importantly we allow our children to learn in a safe and stimulating environment, where their views are valued.
At St Benedict’s, our overall aim is to equip all our pupils with the life skills they need to be able to flourish in the real world and promote a love of maths. We aim to ensure that, regardless of background and ability, every pupil has a rich and meaningful mathematics education. Both staff and pupils understand the importance of automaticity and fluency within maths, and this is taught through real life contexts to enable pupils to apply their understanding, reason about maths, problem solve and make connections across the subject and the wider curriculum. We believe in a language rich environment and our pupils will leave us with the confidence to talk maths, do maths and apply maths to their everyday lives.
Implementation
Our Curriculum:
Our maths curriculum is based on White Rose which is a whole-class mastery programme designed to spark curiosity and excitement and help children develop confidence in maths. Teaching sequences are based on small steps to ensure a good level of coherence, understanding, application of understanding and transference of skills to a range of mathematic problems and contexts. White Rose maps out a long-term plan based on 12 weeks in a term. At St Benedict’s, we have tailored this scheme to suit our pupil’s needs by mapping out the actual weeks in a term and adding in extra units where needed such as problem-solving week, extra units for consolidation or revisiting skills taught earlier on in the term.
Maths lessons:
Every one of our maths lessons is based on the principals that all children can achieve, which is our belief at St Benedict’s. Children are taught in mixed ability groups, with all children accessing the same learning. This allows all children to be exposed to the same content and be offered the same opportunities, rather than placing a cap on children’s learning. Pupils are then given tasks to enrich and stretch this learning in the form of challenges to further challenge the greater depth pupils, and those who may need extra support are supported through scaffolding such as using mathematical manipulatives. No pupils will be given different objectives unless they have an EHCP/SEND.
∙ In order to effectively deliver the White Rose Scheme we have utilised the expertise of our Teaching Assistants to deliver maths to single year groups. The teacher plans and oversees learning but the TA delivers lessons to one year group in each class bi-weekly.
∙ Displays support learning with a focus on: the concrete, pictorial representations, mental strategies, vocabulary and reasoning.
∙ A mental warm up is then completed that either links to work done in the last lesson, or the current lesson or our school KIRF targets.
∙Children are then given a hook- this is a problem / activity linked to the days learning. This is completed in pencil to demonstrate current understanding (revisited at the end of the lesson in pen).
∙The new lesson content is then introduced in the form of small steps and a ping pong style session. There are opportunities for guided practice and independent practice and concrete materials are always on hand if pupils need them. They make that choice themselves to enable them to own their own learning. Each slide takes the pupils through learning rapidly, but the small steps mean that pupils are all brought along together as a whole.
∙ The independent tasks are then explained, and the pupils complete their work at the level that suits them, starting on different questions depending on ability/confidence. The tasks are high ceiling low entry, so that everyone can access the first questions and then go as far through them as they can, completing the extension and enrichment activities if possible.
∙ Teachers active mark through the lesson to provide immediate feedback and intervention where needed.
∙ Mini plenaries are used effectively to address common misconceptions identified by active marking.
∙ At the end of the session pupils return to their ‘hook’ in pen to demonstrate the development of their understanding through the lesson.
∙ We do not provide written feedback to pupils in books or expect this from staff and research shows that verbal feedback at the time of the misconception is more beneficial to move learning forward. Pupils are encouraged to self-mark where appropriate and are expected to correct their mistakes which is shown in purple pen (see marking and feedback policy).
Assessment:
∙ Teachers and TA’s actively assess daily and provide immediate feedback to move learning forwards.
∙ End of unit assessments are carried out from the White Rose scheme and supplemented with other activities where needed, to enable staff to see whether or not the previously taught objectives have been retained.
∙ Our assessment system is updated on a regular basis to keep track of pupil attainment.
∙ Book scans are carried out termly by the maths lead and support put in place for any staff who need it in the form of coaching.
∙ Termly pupil progress meetings are held to discuss pupils and lesson observations in maths and support put in place if needed.
∙ Children’s attainment and progress is discussed with parents/carers during parents evenings
Extra opportunities:
∙ Some pupils may receive extra support to try to catch up/fill gaps from previously missed learning due to COVID or SEND.
∙ We use Times Table Rockstars throughout the school (Year 2 and above) to aid the children with fluency.
∙ Weekly homework is set on Seesaw that encourages the children to develop either fluency skills or reinforces learning from the previous week.
Impact
The Maths lead and the Head teacher take responsibility for the monitoring of the Maths curriculum and the standards achieved by the children.
This monitoring takes the form of:
- Lesson observations and feedback;
- Learning walks and pupil voice conversations;
- Planning scrutiny followed by support where necessary;
- Book scrutinies on a frequent basis;
- Data analysis.
At St Benedict’s you will see a class enthused, engaged, challenged and on task. You will see independence and pupils supporting their peers and explaining tasks to one another. You will see a team, togetherness, and pupils loving learning. You will see pupils ready to use and apply their maths in their everyday lives.
- Children are happy learners who talk enthusiastically about their learning and eager to further their progress in maths
- The impact of ‘mastery’ and the emphasis on accurate use of mathematical language is evident during class/pupil discussions
- Children’s fluency in number is evident
- Consistent teaching practices that enable children to build upon previous learning
- Cross-school moderation highlights the high level of challenge for all ability groups, evident throughout topics through reasoning and problem-solving activities
- Teacher assessment of the depth of learning is also increasingly accurate
- These factors ensure that we are achieving higher standards, with achievement at the end of KS2 in-line with that of the national average, as well an increasing proportion of children demonstrating greater depth, at the end of each phase.
Additional Info
Pupils at St Benedict’s also participate in the external assessments of SATs during Year 2 and the Multiplication Tables check at Year 4. Although our intent is to enable learners to develop deeper mathematical understanding (rather than just meeting the requirements of tests), these assessments are an important measure of the impact of the teaching and learning at St Benedict’s. Pupils in the relevant year groups also undertake practice tests in the build up to the external tests which provide additional evidence for the teacher’s judgement.