At St. Bernadette’s, we aim to ensure that all children develop a deep understanding of mathematics. In doing so, we endeavour to develop enquiring minds and encourage pupils to become self-motivated, confident and capable when solving problems and reasoning in real-life contexts. In line with the National Curriculum for mathematics, we aim to ensure that all pupils: 

• become fluent in the fundamentals of mathematics, including through varied and frequent practice with increasingly complex problems over time, so that pupils have conceptual understanding and are able to recall and apply their knowledge rapidly and accurately to problems 
• can reason mathematically by following a line of enquiry, conjecturing relationships and generalisations, and developing an argument, justification or proof using mathematical language 
• can solve problems by applying their mathematics to a variety of routine and non-routine problems with increasing sophistication, including breaking down problems into a series of simpler steps and persevering in seeking solutions.

We understand the importance of children knowing more than isolated facts and methods. Therefore, we ensure that children have a full understanding of mathematical concepts and the relationships between the different areas of maths, such as addition, subtraction, division and multiplication. 

Through reasoning and higher order questioning, we ensure that children can explain the ‘hows’ and ‘whys’ of maths and that they are able to generalise and justify their thinking. Teachers promote reasoning during maths lessons, through using carefully chosen questions and the use of sentence stems.

We understand that mathematical language is crucial to children’s mathematical thinking and understanding. As a result, we display key vocabulary on our maths working walls and children are encouraged to articulate and explain their thinking at every opportunity. The development of mathematical language begins in the Early Years, where children follow the ‘Mastering Number’ programme, which progresses as they move into and through Key Stage 1. ‘Mastering Number’ helps pupils secure firm foundations in the development of good number sense, with the aim of children leaving KS1 with fluency in calculation and a confidence and flexibility with number. 

Wider opportunities: Our aim is to provide children with opportunities outside of the day-to-day taught curriculum to develop a love of Maths. We do this through our Maths ambassadors and dedicated Maths days which are designed and planned to immerse the children in challenging, practical Maths activities.