Mathematics

Ethos and Values

We believe that mathematics should be interesting, fun, lively, challenging and relevant to students of all ages and abilities. That all students have an entitlement to the appropriate level of work for their age, differentiated accordingly for them to access it. Students should feel inspired, challenged and secure in their lessons, feeling comfortable to learn, express their thoughts, make mistakes and learn from those mistakes.

Teaching and Learning

Mathematics is taught, as part of the whole school policy, in 5 modules per year. Each module includes topics from all mathematics strands. During each module Students complete an independent study (IS) task, which is of a problem solving or investigative nature.

Maths 2

Our assessment is mostly formative, with students self assessing against the recently learned key objective in each topic during a Feedback For Learning (FFL) lesson where they discuss their learning with the teacher, and show examples of their work in a portfolio book, or e-MAP presentation (at KS4). All students are aware of their target grades for the end of year and key stage.

Curriculum Provision

Students are set loosely from Year 8, and organised in mixed ability groupings in Year 7. For Maths, English and Humanities, the 30 or so students who need the most support are taught separately in our ‘small groups’. The rest of the year group are in two halves, with each half being set loosely as per the needs of the students.

Key Resources

The Mathematics faculty enjoys a suite of 5 teaching bases, a resource room and a BOOSTER room. Each teaching base has a number of networked computers, printer, Promethean interactive whiteboard, television, and video. The faculty shares a set of 30 mobile ‘wireless’ laptops, and has recently invested in a class set of remote learning devices.

We are well resourced with numeracy materials, including sets of mini whiteboards and a class set of graphic calculators. The faculty subscribes to www.mymaths.co.uk, a learning and assessment portal, and has obtained a password for each student.

Extra-Curricular Activities

We run extension groups for the very able in Years 7, 8 and 9 after school, and students in these classes are hoping to take GCSE statistics in Mathematics in Year 10. We run Independent Study (IS) help clinics after school on Wednesdays and Thursdays, where students can seek help with their work, and BOOSTER clinics during Monday and Tuesday P6 for students at KS3. From October 2006 PCS will be running an after school Formula 1 club. During these sessions students will create and manage their own motor racing team. They will set up their cars using Maths techniques from the curriculum before racing them against each other on the circuits from a real Formula 1 season. Later in the academic year, student representatives from the school will compete against other schools in the country as part of the national Jaguar Maths Challenge.

In 2005 PCS was awarded Specialist School Status for Mathematics and Science. In 2006 the Mathematics faculty was recognised as the leading faculty in East Sussex (with KS3 results for adding value to student progress amongst the top 2% of schools nationally).