St Martin'sCE Primary School

St. Martin’s 

Maths Curriculum Intent Statement

 “Math is the one language everyone speaks — no matter where you're from.”
 

At St. Martin’s, we believe that mathematics is a universal language that gives every child the tools to make sense of the world around them. We aim to ensure all our pupils feel confident, capable, and curious about maths.

Our Intent

Our maths curriculum is designed to:

• Build strong number fluency through daily practice
• Support all learners with clear mathematical language and visual representations
• Promote deep understanding through a consistent, mastery-based approach
• Connect learning by regularly revisiting and building on previous knowledge

Key Features of Our Maths Structure

1. Daily Fluency

Each day begins with short, focused fluency sessions. These help children recall key number facts quickly and confidently, laying the foundation for higher-level mathematical thinking. Visual aids, manipulatives, and sentence stems support all learners in articulating their understanding.

2. Lesson Starters – Revisiting and Connecting Learning

Every maths lesson starts with a brief activity that revisits previous learning. This reinforces key concepts and provides all pupils with an accessible entry point into the lesson. This approach supports long-term retention and helps children make connections between topics.

3. Oracy 

Children are encouraged to share verbally their own thinking and ideas –  Maths talk is encouraged through whole class and paired/group discussion and teachers use the ‘Think, pair, share’ model to  facilitate opportunities to do this. 

4. Mastery Approach

We follow a mastery approach to maths, where:

• All children move through learning at broadly the same pace
• Concepts are explored in depth before new content is introduced
• Teaching is carefully structured to include concrete, pictorial, and abstract representations
• Language development is a priority — children are encouraged to explain their reasoning, discuss strategies, and use key vocabulary with confidence

Our lessons are inclusive and supportive, with scaffolding where needed to ensure that every child, regardless of their previous mathematical experiences, can succeed and enjoy maths.

By the end of KS1 it is our intent that all children are able to add and subtract 2-digit numbers using an efficient strategy; and to multiply and divide numbers linked to 2, 5 and 10.

By the end of KS2 it is our intent that all children are able to select an efficient method of calculation for all operations; to show calculation fluency and to understand the connections between the four operations.

Our Vision

We want our pupils to leave primary school with:

• A love for maths
• A solid foundation of number sense and problem-solving
• The confidence to talk about maths using precise language
• The skills to apply maths in real-life situations

We believe maths empowers children, and by nurturing mathematical fluency, reasoning, and resilience, we are opening doors for all learners to achieve their full potential.

Curriculum Design (Maths Mastery):

The Mastery-learning model forms the basis of our approach to traditional teaching. This means spending greater time going into depth about a subject as opposed to racing through the things that all children should know. As a Primary school, it is our duty to ensure that children have an absolutely solid, concrete understanding of subject knowledge and skills as well as being emotionally resilient for secondary school. It is about deep and sustainable learning for all children.

 

Teaching for mastery is underpinned by 5 key principles:

1. Cohesion: Sufficient time is spent on well-planned sequences to ensure that key concepts are developed and deeply embedded before moving on.
2. Representation and structure: Mathematical concepts are explored and understood through strong models and images such as Rekenrek counting beads, Ten frames, Numicon, counters and bar modelling. Lessons across the school follow a consistent structure: ‘I do’ (Teacher modelling), ‘We do’ (Guided practice), ‘You do’ (Independent practice).
3. Fluency: Factual knowledge (e.g. number bonds and times tables), procedural knowledge (e.g. formal written methods) and conceptual knowledge (e.g. of place value) are taught in a fully integrated way and are all seen as important elements in the learning of mathematics. Children are able to efficiently select the best method from a variety that they have developed to solve problem. At St.Martin’s, we use Mastering Number in EYFS and Numbersense in KS1/KS2 to ensure daily fluency opportunities.
4. Variation: Conceptual variation and procedural variation are used extensively throughout teaching, to present the mathematics in ways that promote deep, sustainable learning. This is especially evident in the practice that children are given in each session.
5. Deep mathematical thinking: The reasoning behind mathematical processes is emphasised. Teacher/pupil interaction explores in detail how answers were obtained, why the method/strategy worked and what might be the most efficient method/strategy.

Knowledge Acquisition and Lesson Design:

Our lesson design is based on a mastery model. There is regular interchange between concrete/contextual ideas and their abstract/symbolic representation. All lessons are structured to consistently follow the ‘I do’, ‘We do’, ‘You do’ model which moves from teacher modelling through to independent application.

The teacher led element of the session will run for around 30 minutes. It will involve deep mathematical thinking, discussions and practice. The remaining part of the session (typically up to 45mins) will be used for practice, application and intervention. Whilst all children will be working on the same objectives, some may require further support and scaffolding; or may be challenged with a more difficult ‘Challenge 3’ problem-solving and reasoning activity.

Independent work is organised into three activities: 

. 

Challenge 1:

• Skills practice in order to access the key learning and secure the objective.

Challenge 2:

• Application of the key skill e.g. worded problems..
• Conceptual and procedural variation.

Challenge 3:

• Complex, non-routine problems and reasoning.
• Multiple steps, complex thinking and detailed reasoning.
• Opportunities to apply learning and ‘think out of the box’.

 

The whole class is taught mathematics together, with no differentiation by acceleration to new content. The learning needs of individual pupils are addressed through careful scaffolding, skilful questioning and appropriate rapid intervention, in order to provide the necessary support and challenge.

Mathematical generalisations are emphasised as they emerge from underlying mathematics, which is thoroughly explored within contexts that make sense to pupils. Teacher-led discussion is interspersed with short tasks involving pupil to pupil discussion and completion of short activities.

Teachers discuss their mathematics teaching regularly with colleagues, sharing teaching ideas and classroom experiences in detail and working together to improve their practice.

Formative assessment is carried out throughout the lesson; the teacher regularly checks pupils’ knowledge and understanding and adjusts the lesson accordingly. Misconceptions are quickly identified and addressed through ‘live’ (in lesson) marking with the children.

 

Planning

Long Term planning follows the White Rose structure but this is supplemented with high quality, mastery design materials.

Medium Term planning will take the form of S-planning which will reference   White Rose Small Steps and the Ready to Progress material for each year group.

Weekly Planning is constructed by teachers and adapted to meet the needs of the class following assessment and reflection of each lesson. 

 

Home Learning

We aim to focus home learning on securing fluency of basic number facts.              KS2 children have accounts for TTRockstars. This is an online platform that children can access in school and at home and it will support children to secure times tables facts.

Maths in the Early Years

In FS1 the children will explore mathematical concepts through play and begin to be exposed to mathematical language. The environment is carefully set up to enable children to experience mathematical concepts in all areas of learning; using building blocks to create structures and new spaces, doing puzzles and joining in with counting stories and rhymes. Children are encouraged to notice maths around them eg looking for patterns or shapes and use everyday mathematical language eg big, small, more, less. By the end of FS1 it is our intent that children are able to recognise and join in with rote counting accurately, enjoy participation in mathematical stories and rhymes and start to show an understanding of the composition of numbers up to 3.

 

In our Early Years Classroom, the children follow the EYFS curriculum. The vehicle we use to teach Maths is ‘Mastering Number’. This entails a lot of 'hands-on' learning but, most importantly, mathematical language is modelled and developed. We plan carefully to ensure the children have concrete and pictorial experiences of number. We want them to be confident with counting and to begin to use mathematical language. It is also key for later mathematical development that children are beginning to add and subtract as well as show a deep, conceptual understanding of place value. 

By the end of Foundation Stage it is our intent that all children are able to recognise, order and manipulate numbers to 10.