Maths

At St Benedict’s Catholic College, the Mathematics curriculum takes students on a journey through the world of numbers. Studying a range of different topics will enable students to appreciate the importance of a strong set of numeracy skills and encourage pupils to be inquisitive and improve problem solving skills that will stay with them for life.

At the heart of our Mathematics curriculum is the progressive development of pupil’s fluency and mastery of fundamental mathematical skills to ensure success in future career paths and within society. Through exploration and investigation of real-life concepts, a true appreciation of Mathematics will be achieved.

We aim for all pupils to reach their full potential within the subject and develop the confidence to tackle unfamiliar problems. We want our pupils to fully appreciate the importance of Mathematics as a subject and be able to access Numeracy across the curriculum.

Maths is essential to everyday life and necessary for financial literacy and most forms of employment. It’s the key that opens the door to other aspects of life and underpins other areas of the curriculum. We aim to encourage students to recognise maths as a universal language that allows us to communicate with others and to understand, affect and develop the world around us. Maths develops reasoning and problem-solving skills, leading to logical thinking that builds well-rounded and ambitious citizens for the future.

General overview of Maths at St Benedict’s Catholic College Maths Key stage 3 curriculum gives students the opportunity to:

• Become fluent in fundamental mathematical concepts

• Reason mathematically by following lines of inquiry and conjecturing generalisations whilst using mathematical language

• Solve problems by applying their fluency and reasoning skills to both routine and non-routine problems.

The Key Stage 3 curriculum forms a strong basis for the Key Stage 4 study. Through the later years, the three elements of fluency, reasoning and problem solving are still prominent. The content in later years is based heavily on the concepts taught in the earlier years. We have designed the curriculum so that the interconnected nature of mathematics is prevalent. Concepts are studied using prior knowledge and in various context, one example is that we use perimeter of shapes to link the use of adding decimal numbers together. A feature of our curriculum is through a progression model where we build across the 6 components of mathematics and revisit it throughout the 5 years and build upon prior knowledge.  We can see this throughout the KS3 curriculum and moving forward into the KS4 curriculum where the percentages topic is taught in year 8 but then revisited in year 10 and built upon through multistep problems.  It can also be seen in the topic of angles; we revisit the angle facts in year 9 as they are key core knowledge needed but we extend our pupils by touching upon bearings as a KS4 topic to give the students something new to push to and look forward to a deeper understanding of this in KS4.

Through year 7, 8 and 9, we do not teach students in a tiered fashion. There is ‘core’ content followed by content designed to stretch and extend with scaffolding for those needing it to reach the core content. The aim here is not to limit students to a particular tier or outcome at the end of their 5 years of mathematical study. We have high aspirations for our students and our curriculum is built around this. Teachers do however have the autonomy to teach what is appropriate to their students and adapt for their needs. 

In year 7 we have set classes on several factors, from KS2 data given from primary and their understanding on numeracy and problem solving from the base line tests set from the AQA exam board. Year 8 and year 9 classes are tiered from the previous year’s AQA termly tests and unit multiple choice tests. We expect that where students struggle, teachers adjust the curriculum appropriately to ensure that the students can access mathematical concepts at a varying pace. At the top end, we aim to provide opportunities for students go deeper into their understanding and use the time given for the topic rather than accelerate through the curriculum.  To challenge the students and develop on our further education in mathematics, we offer each year group in KS3 and KS4 the opportunity to complete the National Maths Challenge.  We aim to build in more opportunities like our yearly Puzzle Day for Year 7 and Year 8.

The content in year 9 builds on topics taught in years 7 and 8 with students exposed to more challenging reasoning and problem-solving opportunities, this is to make sure there is a strong base for students to move into GCSE content in the next year. In year 9, the aim is not to limit students and hence the curriculum is designed such that students who excel with lower-level content will have the opportunity to see/use higher content and achieve their full potential. We aim to cover the same content to varying levels of difficulty for as long as we can to ensure that this is possible.

Home learning at KS3

Home learning will be mainly set automatically online with use of Sparx. The scheme of work is linked to certain clips that will be used for home learning. KS3 will be set at least 30 minutes of home learning each week. Home learning should be recorded in students’ planners and put onto classcharts

Sparx is set automatically for your whole of year 7 to Year 10. The topics are selected automatically in line with the scheme of work.

What can parents/carers do to support at home?

Being exposed to a subject as vast as mathematics can be somewhat intimidating for children. Having to remember all the notation, vocabulary, equations, graphs, and theorems by heart can put an adult's head in a spin - never mind a child's!

However, learning maths can be fun for children if they are able to practice their math skills in a familiar environment and at their own pace. Kids do most of their learning without even realising!

Learning to identify your children's interests and include them in their education is an excellent way to keep them engaged.

Point out the maths in everyday life. Include your child in activities involving numbers and measuring, such as shopping, cooking and travelling.

For KS4 the mathematics schemes of work broadly follow the AQA new GCSE mathematics 8300 specification and builds on the content developed in KS3.

Students will follow either the foundation or higher scheme of work depending on prior assessments, combined with consideration of the student needs and teachers’ input. Students are not limited to their current tier of study as this is fluid and dependent on the progress that each student is currently making. Problem-solving is at the heart of the new curriculum and opportunities to develop problem solving and reasoning skills in maths are embedded within each unit of work. Once students reach year 11, their teachers will decide how much they need to deviate from the scheme of work based on thorough assessments.  This takes place in lessons and through whole school mock exams, unit assessments, Sparx and QLAs.

The KS4 curriculum is focused on students developing mastery of mathematics and involves:

·         Develop fluent knowledge, skills and understanding of mathematical methods and concepts

·         Acquire, select and apply mathematical techniques to solve problems

·         Reason mathematically, make deductions and inferences and draw conclusions

·         Comprehend, interpret and communicate mathematical information in a variety of forms appropriate to the information and context

Home learning at KS4

Home learning will be mainly set automatically online with use of Sparx. The scheme of work is linked to certain clips that will be used for home learning. KS4 will be set at least 60 minutes of home learning each week. Log on to ClassCharts for more information.

Sparx is set automatically for your whole of year 7 to Year 10, the topics are selected automatically in line with the scheme of work. Teachers may use paper home learning tasks too if they feel Sparx does not fulfil the topic especially for Year 11

What can parents/carers do to support at home?

Encourage a positive and “can do” attitude towards mathematics.

Read through questions with your child and encourage them to pick out information needed to answer it. Provide your child with a revision guide and help them plan their revision.

Encourage your child to talk through topics and explain what they are currently covering. (Let them teach you!)

Look at your child’s work on a regular basis so that you can see the progress of your child.

Help your child if you can but please annotate any help given by writing a note/comment in their exercise book.

Ensure your child catches up on any work missed.

Problem solving skills: Get your child to relate Mathematics to real life e.g.: percentages and best buys in shops. Use DIY projects to get your child to estimate and measure.

Help your child to realise that mathematics is everywhere. For example, when you read the paper or watch the news highlight where mathematics has been used.