The National Mathematics Curriculum Aims

The national curriculum for mathematics 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 nonroutine problems with increasing sophistication, including breaking down problems into a series of simpler steps and persevering in seeking solutions.

Lordsgate Township Maths Curriculum

At Lordsgate, we believe that the best way for children to develop their mathematical understanding is through the use of a Concrete - Pictorial - Abstract model.  The concrete phase of this model allows for the children to learn through the use of practical experiences; the pictorial element takes the work done in the concrete phase and develops models and images to represent it; and the abstract phase uses figures and symbols to represent the models and images developed in the pictorial phase.

It is important to embed mathematical knowledge and conceptual understanding into children's memory so that it can be used as a bedrock to build upon in the future.  As a result we believe that teaching slowly and with a greater emphasis on depth of learning is important.  We use White Rose Maths small steps planning support to help us to break concepts into bite-sized chunks for the children and then build up to more challenging concepts.

Maths Assessment

At Lordsgate, we work alongside the Lancashire Key Performance Indicators for maths for each year group to assess children against age related expectations.  Parents are informed on a termly basis whether their children are working towards, working at, or working above age related expectations.