Downland School

Aspire, Achieve and Thrive

Maths

 Our Aim

At Downland, our mathematics teachers work together to make a big difference for every pupil. We strive to shape happy, confident and resilient learners who discover that mathematics brings an exciting journey of discovery, understanding, and a lifetime of opportunities.

All pupils experience challenges in mathematics, but many pupils at Downland have a negative emotional reaction to the subject following their transition to us from primary school and are less able to deal with these. Our pupils are often anxious about aspects of mathematics and may feel a range of emotions, including frustration and anger. At Downland, we try to remove the negative pressure pupils may feel without removing the challenge.

In order to lay the foundations for learning, we embed practices that build a culture of deep understanding, confidence and competence in mathematics – a culture that produces strong, secure learning and real progress. We know our pupils and the experiences they have had and use this knowledge to make our schemes work for them, adding extra time where necessary for topics that need most attention and adapting other learning accordingly. We model positive attitudes towards mathematics throughout the whole school, ensuring that all staff encourage and model motivation, confidence, and enjoyment in mathematics for all pupils.

Our research-based schemes of learning are designed to support a mastery approach to teaching and learning and are consistent with the aims and objectives of the National Curriculum. Our schemes develop all three key areas of the National Curriculum – fluency, reasoning and problem solving – giving pupils the knowledge and skills they need to become confident mathematicians. We have constructed a curriculum that is ambitious and designed to give all learners the essential knowledge they need to engage in wider society and succeed in life.

Sometimes we might be a little behind or ahead of the scheme schedule; we deliberately build flexibility into our schemes to allow for these variations. We also recognise that spending time on a topic does not mean that all pupils will ‘master’ it the first time they see it. They need to see it again and again in different contexts and in different years to help them truly develop their understanding on their journey to mastery, so we have built in the revisiting and reinforcing features of spiral curricula too.

Year 7/Year 8

At Downland, we use GL assessment with Key Stage 3 pupils to measure their performance across the curriculum and identify gaps in their learning. We also use the Sandwell Early Numeracy Test with our Year 7s to assess their ability with numbers and identify specific numeracy skills requiring targeted teaching. Through robust and regular assessment, we have identified that many of our pupils operate significantly below their age-related expectations. If our pupils are operating significantly behind the expectations for their year group then we need to consider what is realistic for these pupils, given their needs, in terms of catching up and keeping up.

Our KS3 schemes of learning draw upon global best practices and cutting-edge research to boost our pupils’ confidence and give them the best preparation for progressing to GCSE study. Every topic in our KS3 schemes of learning are broken down into manageable steps that build on each other so the learning journey is complete. If appropriate, our teachers focus on teaching the key objectives from the DfE’s ‘Ready-to-Progress’ criteria) – the most crucial steps in children’s learning – to help our teachers take steps to close any gaps or to revise and deepen pupils’ understanding of the most important concepts within the National Curriculum. These crucial steps lay a solid foundation for more complicated learning later on and mean our pupils will be able to more easily access many of the elements of the curriculum as they progress to KS4.

We provide extra scaffolding and support on key concepts, giving pupils the mathematical foundations they need to progress with confidence. We also deepen pupils’ understanding of key concepts, and build problem-solving skills so pupils can explore key concepts to their fullest.

 Year 9

In Year 9, pupils study for an Entry Level Certificate in Mathematics, enabling them to develop the underpinning skills and understanding to provide a progression route to GCSE. We also aspire for all Year 9 pupils to achieve a Functional Skills Qualification in Mathematics at either Level 1 or Level 2. These qualifications are widely accepted as equal to GCSEs by employers and aim to teach the skills that are needed in daily life and the workplace.

Year 10/Year 11

At Downland, we aspire for all pupils to achieve a recognised mathematics qualification. We use our relevant data to monitor pupil progress during KS3 and help inform pupil’s choices for KS4.

The GCSE course for Years 10 and 11 is designed to provide a broad and coherent course of study that encourages our pupils to develop confidence in, and a positive attitude towards, mathematics. Topics are taught in progressively greater depth, building on subject content knowledge that is taught at KS3. Whilst the majority of our pupils are entered for the Foundation Tier, those identified as able, gifted and talented will be entered for the Higher Tier and may be co-taught GCSE Statistics alongside GCSE Mathematics.

Financial Education

On average, children begin to receive pocket money aged seven, own their first mobile phone at eight, and purchase items online at 10, with one in five having used their parents’ or older siblings’ credit or debit card to purchase these items. They can open a bank account and have a debit card at 11. At 18, they can apply for a credit card or loan and before they leave school, they have to make crucial decisions about jobs, student loans and living independently. The need for young people to develop the skills to earn and look after their money has never been stronger.

At Downland, we integrate Financial Education into mathematics lessons to help our pupils to develop skills, knowledge and attitudes around money, preparing them for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of life. Preparing our pupils to become financially capable is an essential part of their education, ensuring that they have the confidence to manage their money effectively and that they are able to make appropriate decisions once they are adults.

We offer a comprehensive Financial Education programme of study as an alternative to GCSE for KS4 pupils who are operating significantly behind the expectations for their year group. Our cross-curricular programme of financial education focuses on three core principles (budget balancing; lifestyle learning; what employers want) and helps give pupils the confidence they need to manage their money, now and in the future.

Mathematics and Literacy

At Downland, we aim to improve literacy in all subject areas. Every teacher communicates their subject through academic language and recognises the importance of teaching pupils’ how to read, write and communicate effectively; literacy skills are at the heart of knowing and doing every subject. In mathematics, we teach spelling, grammar and punctuation explicitly to improve pupils’ writing. We also seize chances to reinforce mathematical vocabulary, considering which words and phrases to teach as part of curriculum planning and providing multiple opportunities for pupils to hear, see and use these words.

Mathematics relies heavily on language skills. This is in terms of the vocabulary used and in understanding the word-based problems in the curriculum and subsequently, the language of mathematics test papers. Considerably more emphasis is now being placed on ‘reasoning’ and ‘problem-solving’ questions since changes to the mathematics curriculum were introduced several years ago. This has dramatically increased the language demands of mathematics as a subject. Every mathematics problem gives directions or asks a question of some sort and a pupil, no matter how good they are at computation, risks getting the problem wrong if they cannot understand what the question is asking them to do. When solving word-based mathematics problems, not only do pupils need to identify the mathematics operation needed, but they also need to understand the vocabulary in order to do just that.

Many pupils at Downland consistently find word problems the most difficult area of mathematics. In testing situations, many of our pupils miss questions or get them wrong, not because they did not understand how to perform the underlying equations, but because they did not understand what calculation was embedded in the language used.

We have developed an approach to teaching mathematics at Downland designed to develop reading comprehension skills for mathematics word problems, to support those pupils whose progress in mathematics is halted by their reading comprehension difficulties. Our approach uses a two-pronged approach: vocabulary work to support comprehension of the text, and visualisation work to support understanding of the situation.

The approach consists of three steps:

  • Step one: vocabulary bombardment of key words to be used throughout the topic (e.g. ‘more’, ‘less’, ‘fewer’).
  • Step two: introduction of visual representation.
  • Step three: word problems. Mathematics word problems are designed, starting with those that can be solved in a single ‘step’ (e.g ‘Last year John was 125 centimetres tall. His height has increased by 9 centimetres. How tall is John now?’) and progressing to include greater numbers of steps.

 Useful Links

Please find our Numeracy Strategy attached here.