OveRVIEW
Ling Moor Primary Academy, Nottinghamshire Participant: Michael Sharpe The school is a mixed, Primary School with 414 pupils on roll. The school is lower than the national average for free school meals with 13% (national average = 23.8%).
AIM
To ensure that the children who attend our school are mathematicians. Our focus is on the children being able to have a fluency in mathematical thinking that enables them to problem solve. We chose to work with the Maths Hub, as a Mastery approach – of deeper, correctly paced learning – was something that really appealed.
Involvement with East Midlands East Maths Hub
We have been involved with East Midlands East Maths Hub since September 2014. Our journey with the Hub began when our Maths Lead and a colleague participated in the first Teaching for Mastery Work Groups. Our Maths Lead went on to become a Primary Mastery Specialist and Assistant Maths Hub Lead. Over the years, 11 Teachers and 10 Teaching Assistants have engaged with Teacher Research Groups (TRGs) and/or Specialist Knowledge for Teaching of Mathematics (SKTMs) to suit their needs. We also fully embrace the Mastering Number Programme and have allowed all staff that deliver the programme to be able to access the training. Our aim is for all staff to experience high quality professional learning in order for them to be able to deliver high quality maths lessons. We are part of the Priory Federation of Academies Trust with the East Midlands East Maths Hub being a key organisation we align to. NCETM is an important partner in ensuring all of the young people we work with are successful mathematicians.
Duration
We have been involved with East Midlands East Maths Hub for over 10 years. We have participated fully in the Primary Teaching for Mastery journey and continue to engage with the Primary offer each year.
Experience and Impact
We were early adopters of the Teaching for Mastery approach and have worked hard to continue to refine and improve the provision of maths for our pupils. The first years were sometimes challenging as external viewpoints around differentiation did not align with what we were aiming to achieve. However, the perseverance has paid off. The Mastery approach to maths is very well embedded and has had a huge influence across the whole of our wider curriculum.
Over time, we have engaged with various mastery schemes and continue to adapt and refine what we offer in the best interests of our pupils. The Mastering Number resource is now fully embedded across the school and is leading to a continued improvement in fluency skills. We strongly believe that the ‘Essence of Teaching for Mastery’ and the 5 Big Ideas provide the foundations for what we do, and as a staff, we will regularly reinforce and revisit the same Teaching for Mastery messages.
The engagement, attitude and understanding of the pupils is very strong. We really focus on small steps and making the new learning as easy as possible, with a real depth of understanding, while being pitched at the expected standard for the age of the pupils. This is then supplemented with our own retrieval systems to encourage knowledge to stick for the long term.
Current data is very strong, both in terms of pupils achieving the expected and greater depth standards at the end of Key Stage 2. It took some time for the Mastery approach to impact on data in terms of test results, but we were confident we were doing the right thing and after several years we now see consistently high performance in National testing.