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Mathematics

Mathematics is essential to everyday life, critical to science, technology and engineering, and necessary in most forms of employment. It is a powerful subject and it should be fun and enjoyable for everyone. It is an essential life skill and it is for this reason that mathematics plays a vital part of the curriculum at Abbey Woods.

Mathematics provides a way of viewing and making sense of the world. It is used to communicate and analyse information and ideas to tackle a range of practical tasks and real-life problems.

At Abbey Woods, maths is taught through the Maths No Problem scheme. Problem-solving, fluency and relational understanding are at the heart of the scheme, allowing pupils to spend enough time to fully explore a topic, and reinforcing it with practice, before moving onto the next one. All ideas are built on previous knowledge and pupils have ample opportunity to develop relationships between topics.

Lessons are typically broken into four parts:

1. Anchor Task - the entire class spends time on a question guided by the teacher. The children are encouraged during this time to think of as many ways as possible to solve the question.

2. New Learning – the teacher introduces and explains the new learning for the lesson.

3. Guided Practice – children practice new learning in groups, pairs or individually guided by the teacher.

4. Independent Practice – practice on your own. Once children have mastered the concept they use their reasoning and problem-solving skills to develop their depth of learning.

Key points:
  • A highly effective approach to teaching maths based on research and evidence
  • Build students’ mathematical fluency without the need for rote learning
  • Introduces new concepts using Bruner’s Concrete Pictorial Abstract (CPA) approach
  • Pupils learn to think mathematically as opposed to reciting formulas they don’t understand
  • Teaches mental strategies to solve problems such as drawing a bar model