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Teaching mathematics in 2004 - how does it fit with the Primary Strategy?
By Paul Broadbent, primary maths author and consultant
The National Literacy and Numeracy strategies have now been united, and primary teachers have another new initiative to get to grips with, as detailed in the document 'Excellence and Enjoyment: a strategy for primary schools'. The Primary Strategy has now officially come into effect, with its emphasis on excellence and enjoyment. What effect will this have on the drive to raise standards of numeracy? Teaching 'basic skills' will still be emphasised, but there will be an increased focus on creativity, mathematical investigation and problem-solving. Planning and assessment will once again be under the spotlight, with schools being encouraged to develop a rich and stimulating curriculum, one that children will enjoy and that makes learning fun.
Secretary of State for Education and Skills, Charles Clarke, launched the Primary Strategy document in May 2003 making the following observations in the introduction:
Excellent teaching gives children the life chances they deserve.
Our system must not fail any child. High standards - especially in literacy and numeracy - are the backbone of success in learning and in life. Our primary education system must not write off any child through low expectations.
Enjoyment is the birthright of every child.
But the most powerful mix is the one that brings the two together. Children learn better when they are excited and engaged - but what excites and engages them best is truly excellent teaching, which challenges them and shows them what they can do. When there is joy in what they are doing, they learn to love learning.
The Secretary of State goes on to encourage schools to take ownership of the curriculum by adopting a creative and innovative approach in how they teach.
So what could this mean for the teacher in the classroom? Is it a return to topic webs and complete freedom for the planning of the curriculum? To a certain extent there has been a recent move towards this, but now - most importantly - the planning is underpinned by the programmes of study of the National Curriculum and the frameworks provided by the Literacy and Numeracy strategies. The document states that there will be guidance on the whole primary curriculum, which will eventually lead to a framework for learning and teaching across the curriculum. It states that it will...
- help teachers to map the development of different learning skills against the opportunities offered by the different curriculum areas
- help schools to shape and define their individual whole-school curriculum
There is no doubt that well planned cross-curricular topics provide a motivating context for developing appropriate skills and concepts. With the recent skills drive, this is an aspect of maths teaching that has been neglected. There is sure to be a surge in real problem-solving and the application of maths within other areas of the curriculum.
The key to the success of this is careful planning of appropriate and focused activities. Planning maths lessons in recent years has become more and more rigorous and detailed; it is now a daily prescription that many teachers feel compelled to follow. The National Curriculum programmes of study give broad areas of mathematics that children need to learn. This has been followed by the very useful Numeracy Framework with its yearly list of teaching objectives - a great help to medium and short-term planning. Finally, there is a set of 'unit plans' that provide detailed, daily lesson plans, based on teaching the framework objectives in a certain prescribed order.
These unit plans sit a little uneasily now, with the emphasis on flexibility and creativity encouraged by the primary strategy. It is probably useful to stand back from the detail of the daily lesson and look at the bigger picture. Concentrate on weekly plans based on a termly scheme of work. This maths scheme of work should be part of a network of linked areas of the curriculum, driven by the individual strengths and needs of the school and class. Once the weekly plans and objectives have been mapped out, the unit plans can be used as sample lessons or as a bank of concentrated lessons to support the focus of the week.
The daily lesson is when the combination of excellent teaching and enjoyment in learning comes to the fore. Enthusiastic and knowledgeable teaching of clearly focused and exciting maths activities will help to develop motivated and keen learners. Most importantly, teaching and learning must be focused on individual pupils' needs and abilities. Differentiated teaching has always been one of the great challenges when working with children with a range of abilities and learning styles. Assessing the needs of individuals is key to this, and many teachers are developing 'assessment for learning', which enables knowledge about individual children to inform the way they are taught and learn.
So, what should mathematics teaching in 2004 look like? Some things won't be different from the previous years. Well planned, structured, daily lessons with a motivating 'starter', a focussed main part and a plenary to end the lesson. Raising standards of numeracy skills is still a target, so there will continue to be an aim for children to be confident with numbers, being able to 'play around' with numbers in their head and use a range of calculation strategies.
The main differences will be increased flexibility and creativity. Children won't be given a predictable diet of staple fodder, but will be offered a wider range of approaches, starting points and activities. This will include more investigative work and problem-solving, which, by their nature, can provide rich tasks differentiated by outcome. |
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