Head of Maths: Fraser Blackwood (f.blackwood@swr.gloucs.sch.uk)

Our intent:

1) Foster a lifelong love of learning mathematics in ALL students. Generating fluent mathematicians and embedding resilience through problem solving and reasoning.

2) Develop pupils into people who are ready to face the mathematical challenges that life creates either in their careers, personal lives or in further study.

3) Effectively deliver the KS3 and KS4 national curriculum as directed: Broad and rich curriculum, embedding the mastery model.

Extra-Curricular

We run a maths group challenge in each year group within the Athelstan trust. We compete in each year group once a year against the other schools.

As a school we compete in the UKMT maths challenge at junior and intermediate levels.

There is also an opportunity to look at the further maths GCSE in years 10 and 11.

The Big Picture

Mathematics is a creative and highly inter-connected discipline that has been developed over centuries, providing the solution to some of history’s most intriguing problems. It is essential to everyday life, critical to science, technology and engineering, and necessary for financial literacy and most forms of employment. A high-quality mathematics education therefore provides a foundation for understanding the world, the ability to reason mathematically, an appreciation of the beauty and power of mathematics, and a sense of enjoyment and curiosity about the subject.

Mathematics is an interconnected subject in which pupils need to be able to move fluently between representations of mathematical ideas. The programmes of study are, by necessity, organised into apparently distinct domains, but the teacher will make, and pupils should make rich connections across mathematical ideas to develop fluency, mathematical reasoning and competence in solving increasingly sophisticated problems.

At the end of year 11 the course is assessed with 3 exams each 1 hour 30 minutes long. Paper 1 is a non-calculator paper and papers 2 and 3 are both calculator papers. Each paper contributes equally towards their maths GCSE. The exam papers can be taken at either higher or foundation tier level. Each exam paper assesses on all knowledge and skills gained from the course of study.