Mathematics

Pure mathematics is, in its way, the poetry of logical ideas.
— Albert Einstein

At Illogan School, we aim to develop a love of mathematics in all children. We are committed to ensuring our mathematics curriculum is engaging, challenging and relevant so that all children have a positive and meaningful experience of the subject.

We recognise that mathematics is essential to everyday life, stimulates curiosity and equips children with the skills they need to thrive as responsible members of the community. Therefore, we aim to:

enable children to be fluent in the fundamentals of mathematics through varied and frequent practice with increasingly complex problems, helping children to develop conceptual understanding and the ability to recall and apply knowledge rapidly and accurately.
support children to reason mathematically by following a line of enquiry, conjecturing relationships and generalisations, and developing an argument, justification or proof using mathematical language
encourage children to become problem solvers by: applying their mathematics to a variety of contexts; to move fluently between representations of mathematical ideas and concepts; to break down problems into a series of smaller steps; and develop their skills of resilience and perseverance.

How do we teach Maths at Illogan?

At Illogan School, the pedagogy underlining our mathematics curriculum is the 5 big mastery principles of coherence, fluency, variation, mathematical thinking and representation and structure. This enables us to offer a high-quality mathematics education which is inclusive and allows all children to make progress.

Our curriculum is based on the aims detailed in the National Curriculum and is organised into distinct domains set out within the White Rose Maths scheme where children are encouraged to make rich connections across mathematical ideas. Each domain is carefully sequenced and broken down into small, achievable steps to ensure that learning is mastered before being built upon. The expectation is that the majority of pupils will move through the programmes of study at broadly the same pace. However, our highly trained teachers make decisions on progress based on the security of children’s understanding. Children who grasp concepts quickly are challenged through rich and sophisticated problems, and those who are not sufficiently fluent are offered opportunities to consolidate their understanding. We believe a depth of learning is a fundamental principle to our mathematics teaching. All children explore mathematical challenges through a range of experiences; using manipulatives, representations and visual prompts to scaffold their understanding of mathematical ideas. Children are taught, and provided with opportunities to use the correct mathematical language to communicate, discuss and explain their thinking.

EYFS

We recognise that early mathematical knowledge is an essential foundation stone of every child’s education journey and our Early Years team aim to inspire confidence and develop positive attitudes in mathematics for all children at Illogan School.

We aim to provide rich opportunities for children to explore mathematics through fun, real life activities, games and play. Through these carefully planned experiences children are immersed in opportunities to develop number recognition, counting, patterns, shapes and spatial reasoning skills. Additionally, children participate in daily adult led session to develop, discuss and explore new mathematical ideas together.

Our curriculum is based on the objectives in the ‘Curriculum Guidance for the Foundation Stage’ ensuring that all children are working towards the ‘Early Learning Goals for Mathematics’. Our EYFS teacher uses the White Rose Maths scheme to structure, support and assess learning and NCETM Mastering Number resources to give children a good early understanding of number.

More information regarding our Mathematics curriculum and calculations policies can be downloaded from the links below:

Intent-Implementation-Maths

White Rose Progression Document

Addition and subtraction calculation policy

Multiplication and Division calculation policy V2

Supporting Every Pupil in Mathematics