At St. Andrew's Junior School we want all children to love Maths so that they develop positive attitudes towards maths and are confident and independent in using mathematics daily – in or out of school.  We want them not to think of maths as a separate skill or subject but instead, to think of it is part of their daily language for communication – to help them explain their understanding of the world around them and the context they are living in.

We believe that Maths is a series of stepping stones that children must cross over in order to build their overall confidence and understanding of the National Curriculum Objectives. We are not afraid of mistakes here at St. Andrew's and understand that when children persevere and are resilient to making mistakes, their learning develops to become deep-rooted so that they have full confidence in what they have learnt and can re-use that learning in the future.

Our vision is for all children to achieve mathematical fluency and understanding in a practical and engaging way with the occasional challenge that makes them stop and think along the journey! We know that Maths can be an area that many children and adults feel less confident in and therefore we hope that this page will be a reference point for all and provide you with helpful and practical information and resources. 

In the new National Curriculum (September 2014), there are three Aims central to everything within the Mathematics:

• Reasoning – following a line of enquiry, conjecturing ideas, and developing an argument, justification or proof using mathematical language;
• Fluency – being able to make connections and use what they know to find out what they don’t know, so that pupils develop conceptual understanding;
• Problem solving – applying their skills to a variety of problems, breaking them down into smaller steps in order to solve them.
   

Everything we do in Maths is designed to achieve these aims. Every Maths lesson should include all three of these core areas.

We understand that all children learn differently and grasp some areas of the curriculum quicker than others. It is important that wherever children are on their learning journey they are equipped with the right tools to help them along the way. At St. Andrew's we do not underestimate the power and importance of using concrete resources and manipulatives (real-life objects), pictorial representations (pictures and images) and also a range more abstract concepts (formal written methods).

These three building blocks not only support the National Curriculum aims and objectives but help to cement and root them in your child's mathematical learning and development.

White Rose Curriculum Overviews