Maths

At St. Luke’s, across Years 1 to 6, we use the Maths – No Problem! programme. It is a highly structured approach to teaching maths and deepens the understanding of all children. Each lesson is based around an ‘anchor task’ which the children explore using different methods. The children are encouraged to talk about their maths and explore their ideas fully, then work independently using the workbooks.

Maths — No Problem! is a series of textbooks and workbooks written to meet the requirements of the 2014 English National Curriculum. The Maths — No Problem! Primary Series was assessed by the DfE’s expert panel, which judged that it alone met the core criteria for a high-quality textbook to support teaching for mastery maths. As a result, the Maths — No Problem! Primary Series is the only recommended textbook for schools on the mastery programme.

Teaching maths for mastery is a transformational approach to maths teaching which stems from high performing Asian nations such as Singapore. When taught to master maths, children develop their mathematical fluency without resorting to rote learning and are able to solve non-routine maths problems without having to memorise procedures.

This approach may be very different to the way in which you were taught yourself. To help you support your child at home, please click on the ‘Parent Videos’ below, which will give you an insight into some of the mathematical approaches.

We are very excited to be part of this mathematical journey!

Fundamental Idea

Dr Yeap talks about one of the fundamental ideas in mathematics: that items can only be counted, added, and subtracted if they have the same nouns. He uses a simple example with concrete objects, chocolates and glue sticks to illustrate the point and then shows how it relates to column addition and the addition of fractions.

Number Bonds

Dr. Yeap explains how young children can use concrete materials and later use pictorial representations as number bonds. Number bonds represent how numbers can be split up into their component parts. Children can explore number bonds using a variety of concrete materials, such as counters with containers and ten frames or with symbols.

Subtraction

Dr. Yeap explains how standard column subtraction can be taught meaningfully by using children's knowledge of number bonds. Once children can explain how numbers can be split into their component parts, they can adapt their understanding to the conventional column subtraction method.

Mental Calculations

Dr. Yeap discusses how children can develop an ability to calculate the four operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication and division) in their heads without the use of paper and pencil or calculators.

Multiplication

Dr. Yeap discusses how children can learn their times tables meaningfully by using visualisation and other strategies.

Long Division

Dr Yeap discusses how children can learn to do long division meaningfully by first using concrete apparatus, such as base-10 materials, to perform the operations. They can then explore how this idea is represented in the long division algorithm.

Bar Model 1

Dr. Yeap discusses how diagrams can be used to represent a situation in a problem: such as rectangles representing (unknown) quantities. This method of visualising problems is known as the bar model.

Bar Model 2

Dr. Yeap gives another example of the bar model: how diagrams can be used to represent situations in a problem.

Maths

Fundamental Idea

Number Bonds

Subtraction

Mental Calculations

Multiplication

Long Division

Bar Model 1

Bar Model 2

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