At St. Mary’s, we are committed to working towards a mastery curriculum. We believe that Mathematics teaches us how to make sense of the world around us through developing a child's fluency (ability to calculate), to reason and to solve problems. In our school, we teach our children a rich, deep and progressive curriculum. Helping children to understand and appreciate the pattern in both number and space in their everyday lives, we build a growing knowledge and understanding of the world. By developing secure foundational skills and ensuring key concepts are sound, we equip children to solve a wide range of problems and think in ways that are more abstract. Children who grasp concepts more rapidly will be extended by going into greater depth on the age-related objectives. Children who find specific concepts more difficult to grasp will be given extra support during, before and/or after lessons as capacity allows.

Teaching of Mathematics follows the National Curriculum and reflects changes introduced in 2014 for Key Stages 1 and 2 and the Curriculum for EYFS. Our curriculum follows three key principles:

Fluency

Developing children's skills through a better understanding of numbers and how to manipulate them, as well as enhancing their knowledge of mathematical concepts and procedures.

Mathematical reasoning

Children learn to follow a line of enquiry, exploring relationships and discussing general rules.  They form and develop arguments about mathematical scenarios and find proof to justify their decisions.

Problem solving

By providing opportunities to apply their mathematical skills in different contexts and across a range of subject areas, children will be able to work systematically to organise information, find patterns and ultimately solutions through independent and collaborative learning.