Maths
At Holland House Infant School we strive to make our curriculum exciting, engaging and most of all purposeful and maths is no different; it is taught daily in line with the National Curriculum. The different areas of mathematics are covered throughout the year and they include; place value, number, shape, measure and fractions. Each area of maths provides opportunities for children to use and apply what they have learnt in a wide range of contexts. Our aim is to challenge all pupils to develop a deeper level of understanding; this is taught using a mastery approach. We access resources from the White Rose Hub to support teaching and learning as well NCETM (National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics) which promotes excellence in mathematics.
We explore and demonstrate concepts through the use of practical apparatus for example:
- Numicon
- Cubes
- Counters
- Dienes
Mathematical concepts are taught through modelling and demonstrating; children are encouraged to use a wide range of concrete objects to support their conceptual understanding.
When the children are ready they are then taught to use pictorial representation to support their understanding of key concepts before moving on to the abstract form of number.
This enables them to understand the concept rather than just developing the strategy.
Throughout lessons, children are encouraged to reason, explore, explain and discuss a wide range of problems and strategies.
Maths activities are directly linked to a learning objective which has clearly identified success criteria. These learning objectives are shared with the children at the start of their learning helping them to understand what they are learning and therefore make maximum progress within the lesson. Activities are often practical and may be recorded in books. They may also be problem solving activities or completed using ICT. This helps to create a rich rounded engaging maths curriculum that inspires all children.
Times Tables
The teaching and learning of times tables is crucial as it supports many areas of the maths curriculum. Children are encouraged to learn their times tables at home as well as at school and regular practice is important. By the end of year 2 age related expectations are that children should know their 2, 5 and 10 times tables by heart. Children are initially taught multiplication as repeated addition which quickly moves to pictorial arrays and then groups of.
