Our Maths Vision

At Woods Bank Academy we believe the purpose of education is to provide pupils with the powerful knowledge required to take them above and beyond their everyday experiences and interests. By developing a life-long love of learning, a sense of belonging and resilience in our pupils, we aim to give them the tools required to live rich, fulfilling lives.

Our Maths Curriculum

At Woods Bank Academy, our maths curriculum is designed to provide children with opportunities to:

• develop their mathematical fluency in a range of areas through a concrete, pictorial and abstract (CPA) approach.

• apply their understanding to be able to solve problems in a range of different contexts

• explain their reasoning when identifying solutions to problems and when responding to mathematical statements

Our mathematics curriculum offers a broad range of experiences designed to provide pupils with the mathematical understanding, skills and knowledge needed to enable them to BELONG, LEARN and GROW in our school and beyond. It embeds a deeper understanding of maths by utilising a concrete, pictorial and abstract approach so that pupils understand what they are doing rather than just learning to repeat routines without grasping what is happening.

As a school, we follow the White Rose Hub sequences of learning to build children’s depth of understanding when teaching each mathematical skill. The blocking sequence has been adapted to suit the needs of our learners whilst still offering a broad and balanced curriculum.

At the beginning of a maths lesson, children are exposed to a starter activity which will have been specifically selected to either address misconceptions or consolidate previous learning. This is to ensure prior knowledge is consistently drawn upon and children have a solid foundation in mathematics basic skills which can be built upon through the curriculum. This also enables children to develop a solid understanding of number and place value which underpins the mathematics curriculum.

Resources

To ensure consistent implementation of the CPA approach, each class has a range of resources to support learning and these are readily available for the children to use. We also have a central resource base that can be accessed when additional concrete resources are required.

Times Tables

Effective understanding and recall of times tables facts underpins understanding of many other mathematical concepts and the mathematics curriculum involves children being fluent in number skills. Our times table approach encourages all children to learn their times tables at the age related expectation. They are tested every week and their challenge is linked to personal achievement and improvement where children strive to have a ‘gold selling album’ through an X Factor themed incentive.