Maths and the Wider Curriculum

Teachers plan and facilitate children with opportunities to use and apply their Maths skills in different contexts across the curriculum.

Year 4: “We looked at Tax and saw how much money is spent on schools.”

Year 6: “I drew a bar graph to show how many people recycled correctly and how many recycled incorrectly.”

Year 5: “We looked at working out costs and working to a budget.”

Maths lessons

At King's Ford Academy, the teaching of Maths is taught through a small steps approach. Teachers adapt their planning to meet the needs of the children in the class. Maths lessons utilise mathematical talk and varied fluency to support children to move through pictorial, concreate and abstract concepts to achieve Maths mastery. Lessons also include problem solving and reasoning questions to give children an opportunity to apply the Maths learnt in different contexts which encourages them to think out of the box, apply their learning to real-life contexts and articulate their learning. 

Practical and outdoor learning

Teachers plan learning experiences which use resources and outside learning to support engagement and progress.

Maths learning environment

Every class has a Maths Working Wall which reflects the children’s learning, it aims to support the use of mathematical vocabulary and independence in class.

In addition to the Working Wall, teachers display modelling to support children’s progress and independence.

Times tables

To further support the children’s mathematical fluency, all children have access to Times Tables Rock Stars (TTRS). This is an online platform where children can learn and practice their times tables set by their teachers. All children are baselined half-termly to track progress. To support progress, they have their individual username and password to access TTRS at home.

Mathematical fluency

To support children’s mental maths and mathematical fluency skills, children regularly revisit basic skills during Flashback 4 sessions and timetabled weekly arithmetic. Both strategies are used to address misconceptions identified in previous learning, identify gaps in children’s knowledge and confidence and  revisit previously learnt skills. This can then lead to an intervention if any children still are not secure. This process ensures most children embed the necessary skills to achieve well in primary and also further education.

Maths life skills

Maths skills are life skills. At King's Ford Academy we acknowledge that children need to leave primary school with mathematical life skills therefore lesson sequences provide all children with the opportunity to discuss and explain why they learn mathematical skills and how it can help them later in life. A good example is how rounding is used when going food shopping, so they have an idea about how much they have spent so far.

Challenge for all!

We are an aspirational school and maths lessons offer all students the opportunity to challenge themselves in their own way. To ensure all children feel challenged in maths, a Dive Deeper activity has been introduced and implemented into classroom practice to allow all children to achieve their maximum potential, by making stronger connections with number in a variety of representations.