Maths at Mandeville provides children with calculation, reasoning and problem solving skills, and a secure knowledge of our number system. Mandeville adopted the mastery approach to the teaching and learning of mathematics six years ago, and the impact across the school has been extremely successful. Teachers and children have a shared language and mathematical understanding. In addition, our children have flourished in their ability to be flexible mathematical thinkers and manipulate numbers efficiently. 

A mastery approach to the teaching and learning of mathematics ensures that children are able to master mathematical concepts and apply their understanding in a range of contexts. In a mastery approach, which originated from Singapore and Shanghai, children are taught to explore different ways to solve a problem, and communicate their strategies for doing so, effectively.  Multiple representations are used to model mathematical concepts, and these will include standard, non-standard and non-conceptual representations, in order to challenge and affirm children’s mathematical thinking and understanding. The carefully designed sequence of learning from our textbook scheme, Maths No Problem, is followed across the school from year 1 to year 6. This ensures that learning is consistent, revisited, reactivated and built on strong number foundations, in line with our spiral curriculum.

Fluency sessions supplement the daily mathematics lesson every day, providing planned opportunities for children to practice and hone their rapid recall of number facts, and deepen their conceptual understanding of the number system and calculation methods. Mathematical fluency enables children to reason, make connections, speculate, generalise and prove theories. These sessions encourage children to solve problems by choosing the most efficient strategies based on their knowledge of number relationships and patterns. 

Problem solving is at the heart of every mathematics lesson at Mandeville and precise mathematical language is modelled and promoted consistently. This makes it possible for all children to explain their thinking and engage successfully with challenging mathematical problems.