At St. Dunstan’s we believe that mathematics is about developing a love of number for life. We know that it is about establishing a deep and lasting understanding of number and mathematical concepts, which helps prepare the children for all of their future endeavours. We want all children to achieve success in mathematics and believe in creating a supportive environment and positive learning experiences to support children to unlock their full potential for mathematics.

Our carefully designed curriculum enables children’s confidence in number to develop as they move through the school, which enables them to make sense of the world and to solve real-life problems.  This in turn, provides an opportunity for children to consider the possible ways to solve problems and to begin to make connections to other maths topics. 

We follow a maths mastery approach which gradually builds concepts in depth by using small steps of learning, building on prior learning. This supports all pupils to make progress whilst developing a deeper and lasting understanding.  We use White Rose maths and the NCETM (National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics) to sequence our curriculum into the building blocks providing progression across all years. Our curriculum begins with place value, which underpins our number system before moving to calculation and other maths strands such as measure, fractions and geometry.

The national curriculum for mathematics aims to ensure that all pupils:

• become fluent in the fundamentals of mathematics
• reason mathematically by following a line of enquiry
• can solve problems by applying their mathematics

In EYFS:

We provide practical opportunities for children to develop their mathematical knowledge and deepen their understanding of numbers to 10. Through play and exploration, children will begin to spot patterns, solve problems and use an increasing range of mathematical vocabulary to explain their learning. 

In Key Stage 1:

Children will develop their understanding of numbers up to 100, counting both forwards and backwards and begin to count in multiples. A key focus within Key Stage 1 is to begin to develop fluency and flexibility with number along with introducing the four operations. We continue to encourage children to discuss their learning using key mathematical vocabulary to explain their thoughts in detail.

In Key Stage 2:

Children continue to develop their fluency with number and understanding of the four operations where they will be working with increasingly larger numbers and whilst building their skills to help them to solve multi-step problems. Times tables will also be a focus, initially developing fluency and recall and later on to be able to apply these across a variety of topics.