Our approach to MATHS

At Parson Street Primary School we deliver a mastery approach to the teaching of Maths and it is our belief that all pupils have the potential to succeed.  Our pupils have access to the same curriculum content and are challenged to deepen their conceptual understanding with rich reasoning task and varied problems. Reception to Year 6 pupils are taught using the Mastery Mathematics programme -https://www.mathematicsmastery.org. Throughout the school, pupils are taught in following the Mathematics Mastery six-part lesson format. This allows for teaching to build upon prior understanding and new learning to be introduced in small manageable steps.

Maths Meetings are taught in order to consolidate prior knowledge and ensure key learning is repeated regularly and understanding is developed through a variety of examples and non-examples. These lessons are taught from Nursery through to Year 6.

Our Calculations Guidance outlines strategies which enable our pupils to show their knowledge and understanding of procedures through the use of concrete, pictorial and abstract representations. Teachers systematically plan calculations as problems to make sure that our pupils access both standard and non-standard examples. In order to extend pupils learning, we use Mathematics Mastery ‘Ideas for Depth’ across the school. Pupils responding to these problems are challenged to apply their understanding including proving statements, asking questions and finding missing answers. The Calculations Guidance can be used as a reference for the strategies that children will be taught within each year group. It can be used by parents and teachers to find appropriate concrete and pictorial representations that support pupils’ understanding.

How does the mastery approach fit with the 2014 Primary National Curriculum?  The Curriculum sets out end of Key Stage expectations as well as suggested goals for the end of each academic year. There is also a focus on developing pupils’ deeper understanding and a greater expectation on the achievement of pupils. The need for formal methods is supported by the formal requirement for pupils to use varied and numerous representations such as pictorial representations or models. Within the curriculum, significance is placed on the development of pupils’ mathematical language. This is a key component of Maths Mastery. Across our school, new mathematical vocabulary is introduced and explained precisely as Star Words in each lesson. Pupils are expected to respond in full sentence explanations and teachers model accurate mathematical language.