St Nicolas Maths Intent 

At St Nicolas C of E Academy, we teach Maths using the Power Maths scheme, which is a whole class, textbook-based mastery resource. It is based on a small-steps approach, which means the concepts are broken down so the children can acquire a deep, long-term, secure and adaptable understanding.

It has been designed to support and challenge all pupils, and is built on the belief that EVERYONE can learn maths successfully, by building number fluency, confidence and understanding, step by step. By taking a Concrete-Pictorial-Abstract (C-P-A) approach, Power Maths allows children to tackle concepts in a tangible and accessible way.

All ideas are built on previous knowledge and pupils have lots of opportunity to recognise relationships between topics.

Lessons typically are split into six parts:

1. Fluency/ Power Up- each lesson begins with a fluency or Power Up activity which supports fluency in key number facts and reinforces key skills such as times-tables, number bonds and working with place value. 
2. Discover- the class are given a problem to solve, often a real-life example, sometimes a puzzle or a game to explore, which introduces the new learning. These are engaging and fun, and designed to get all children thinking. It is usually completed in pairs with concrete materials.
3.  Share- the class shares their ideas and compares different ways to solve the problem, explaining their reasoning with hands-on resources and drawings to make their ideas clear. Children are able to develop their understanding of the concept with input from the teacher.
4. Thinking Together- the next part of the lesson is a journey through the concept, digging deeper and deeper so that each child builds on secure foundations while being challenged to apply their understanding in different ways and with increasing independence. It follows the ‘I do, we do, you do’ structure, which gives the children opportunities to think together in their groups and also work independently.
5. Practice- now children practice individually or in small groups, rehearsing and developing their skills to build fluency, understanding of the concept and confidence. The children are encouraged to use concrete materials and mathematical representations and structures to support their understanding as necessary.
6. Reflect- finally, children are prompted to reflect on and record their learning from each session and show how they have grasped the concept explored in the lesson.

Key points:

• We believe that every child can achieve.
• Small steps build a solid foundation of deep mathematical understanding.  We builds pupils’ mathematical fluency without the need for rote learning.
• New concepts are introduced using the Concrete-Pictorial- Abstract (CPA) approach
• Pupils learn to think mathematically to find patterns, connections and relationships between different concepts.

On this page you will find the yearly and termly overviews for each year group: as well as the calculation policies which follow the Power Maths scheme. Please click the sub pages for more information. We also use Times Tables Rockstars as a tool to help pupils develop fluency in multiplication tables in school and at home.