Teaching for Mastery

Our approach to teaching maths aims for pupils to acquire a deep, long-term, secure and adaptable understanding of the subject. The mathematics curriculum at Bakewell Infants is carefully designed to build sequentially in small steps which allow children to make connections to prior learning. Each unit and each year group have defined endpoints that all children are expected to achieve which is in line with the National Curriculum and results in increasing proportions of pupils attaining the age-related-expectation or better whilst making good progress.

The phrase ‘teaching for mastery’ describes the elements of classroom practice and school organisation that combine to give pupils the best chances of mastering maths.

Achieving mastery means acquiring a solid enough understanding of the concept that has been taught to enable pupils to move on to more advanced material.

The Five Big Ideas underpin teaching for mastery in our school. Click here for more information.

Our lesson planning begins with what we want our pupils to think and notice, rather than what we want them to do.

We base our lessons on a maths mastery scheme called "Maths - No Problem!" We researched and trialled various approaches before choosing this system. We like it because it is child-centered and fun to teach, as well as having been assessed by the Department for Education as a high-quality textbook to support teaching for mastery. Importantly, we find it to be a very inclusive approach where all children achieve.

Maths Progression Documents

As we have a mixed Year 1 and 2 class we have reordered the Maths No Problem Scheme so that both Year groups are working on the same Mathematical skills at the same time.

These are supported using the Maths No Problem Progression Documents

Maths No Problem videos for parents

The Maths No Problem! team have created a series of videos for parents to explain the Teaching for Mastery (TfM) approach. Included is a video explaining the fundamental idea behind TfM, as well as concept-specific videos on subtraction, number bonds, multiplication, long division, and bar models. Click here

The included document also details how we teach number bonds.