Mathematics

Maths at Milton Park

At Milton Park Primary School we develop our children to be confident mathematicians, who experience the full richness of an exciting and varied maths curriculum. The children learn in a fun and practical way which ensures they have a deeper understanding of concepts before moving on.We endeavour to promote a love and enjoyment for Mathematics and believe that every child can achieve. Our approach to teaching maths enables children to work collaboratively, to communicate their ideas clearly and to be able to problem solve effectively. We also provide an environment rich with vocabulary, models and images. We believe that where possible, lesson objectives should be taught in a real life, practical context. 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.

We use the National Curriculum which we implement through using methods from the White Rose Hub to support our teaching and learning. These aims and objectives are taught across the school in daily maths lessons. Lessons are designed to challenge learners of all abilities through rich and sophisticated problems.

 The White Rose scheme of learning is designed to support a mastery approach to teaching and learning, as well as to support the aims and objectives of the National Curriculum. The White Rose scheme has number at its heart and a lot of time is spent reinforcing number to build competency. It also provides opportunities to build reasoning and problem-solving into each lesson. White Rose believes that all children, who are introduced to a concept, should have the opportunity to build on their abilities by following a concrete-pictorial-abstract approach.

Concrete – Children should have the opportunity to use mathematical  objects to help them envisage what written numbers represent.

Pictorial – Children should have the opportunity to use pictures as representations to continue to support them in visualising what written numbers represent.

Abstract – Abstract learning is the use of digits and words to represent numbers.

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.

In addition to daily lessons, we revisit key concepts through our rolling programme of 20 minute Maths Blasts to help embed in the long-term memory. 

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

Times Tables Rockstars 

Recall of times tables and number bonds are vital as a foundation for maths. Because of this, Milton Park has subscribed to Times Tables Rock Stars. TT Rockstars is a carefully sequenced programme of daily times tables practice that we use in school and can be accessed from home using the link below.

TT Rockstars has very successfully boosted times tables recall speed for hundreds of thousands of pupils over the last 8 years in over 12,000 schools - both primary and secondary - worldwide.

Please find the link to access below.

• Times Tables Rock Stars