Mathematics is an important, creative discipline that has traditionally been taught by memorising key facts and figures, which leads to a lack of conceptual understanding. At Oldmixon Primary School, we are committed to ensuring that children develop a deep and conceptual understanding of mathematics and are able to use their mathematical skills and knowledge confidently in a range of different contexts.

We endeavour to promote a love and enjoyment for Mathematics and believe that every child can achieve!

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 non-routine problems with increasing sophistication, including breaking down problems into a series of simpler steps and persevering in seeking solutions.

To ensure whole school consistency and progression, Oldmixon Primary School uses White Rose Maths from year 1 to year 6 to support teaching and learning of maths, which allows children to discover new maths problems and share and discuss ideas before independently working on fluency, reasoning and problem solving questions. Teachers use careful questioning to draw out children’s discussions and reasoning and sentence stems are often used to support children in articulating their reasoning. Children are exposed to a range of different manipulatives and resources to support their learning to ensure that every child develops a deep and conceptual understanding of maths concepts. Mathematical topics are taught in blocks and children are extended with rich and sophisticated problem solving as well as investigative tasks as appropriate.

In EYFS, Maths is taught daily including new learning as well as revisiting previous learning in short, concise lessons. Each week, children complete Maths learning activities in continuous provision as well as adult-led activities.

Next year (2024/25), EYFS and KS1 will also be starting to learn from a programme called Mastering Number which will support children to secure number sense and develop fluency in calculation in order to build secure foundations of Maths learning.

By the end of KS2, we aim for children to be fluent in the fundamentals of mathematics with a conceptual understanding and have the ability to confidently recall and apply knowledge rapidly and accurately. Children will be able to reason mathematically by following a line of enquiry and develop and present a justification, argument or proof using mathematical knowledge. They will also be able to use their knowledge and skills to solve problems by applying their mathematical knowledge to a variety of contexts with increasing sophistication.

NFER tests are also used in the Spring and Summer terms to assess children’s progress and attainment in mathematics.