At St Mary’s we adopt a Maths mastery approach to this key subject.
Maths mastery is a teaching and learning approach that aims for pupils to develop deep understanding of maths rather than being able to memorise key procedures or resort to rote learning.
The end goal and expectation is for all pupils (with very limited exceptions) to have acquired the fundamental facts and concepts of maths for their year or key stage such that by the end of it they have achieved mastery in the maths they have been taught. At this point they are ready to move confidently on to their next stage of maths.
Mastery of a mathematical concept means a child can use their knowledge of the concept to solve unfamiliar word problems, and undertake complex reasoning, using the appropriate mathematical vocabulary.
NCETM, the National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics has championed the Singapore and Shanghai approach to mastery maths since the start of the 2014 National Curriculum.
They have further broken it down for their maths hubs training hundreds of primary maths teachers to include ‘5 big ideas in teaching for mastery’ ie
- Coherence
- Representation and Structure
- Mathematical Thinking
- Fluency
- Variation
At St Mary’s we are working with our local maths Hub and Local Authority Maths advisors to consolidate our teaching of Maths mastery.
Here is a link to the NCETM website explaining Maths Mastery
We have signed up to Numbots a game designed to reinforce learning in school and all pupils have a username and password for this. Please ask your child’s class teacher for a copy if you can’t find it.