SATS KS1 Maths in particular

[Jim999]

TEST

[user789653241]

"how do you trust trust your children's teacher to be able to deliver multiple different ways of doing something every time they do maths?"

That's why you need the book explaining it. Some children grasp quickly and move on to next. Some will be still mastering it. Some children find it easier to get on with traditional column methods, some don't. That's why they give choice these days. And maths has moved on in so many ways since 10+, 20+, 30+, etc., years ago, and some methods they teach are better for some children.

[user789653241]

Sorry, seems to be cross posting, there are as many policies as number of schools. Each school has different policies. It include the methods they choose to teach in that particular school. So, knowing your grand daughter's school's policy is the first step you need to take.

[Jim999]

..and again as far as I am aware Khan Academy may be brilliant but you are completely missing the point - if there are 'options' then how do I find out what they are? It may be that the Khan Academy way is brilliant but on the other hand it may not be .....again it just seems to be a lot of large organisations and bureaucrats riding on the back of my grand daughters education..............

p.s. see that times tables are being reintroduced ....at least we can sing them in the car instead of I-spy again :-)

[Jim999]

so you are saying that each school can teach maths however they feel they want to (and I use the word 'teach' very loosely)....I think that's why I started the post in the first place

I'm not knocking primary school teachers but why do children not have maths text books any more or any explanation what they need to practice other than being sent home with photocopied worksheets?

[Jim999]

'And maths has moved on in so many ways since 10+, 20+, 30+, etc., years ago, and some methods they teach are better for some children'

So are these the ones they concentrate on then? Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose

[PickleFish]

But the book I suggested sounds exactly what you are looking for - it goes through the various ways that they are taught now. They will be taught several methods, one building on from the other, leading up to the most abstract/efficient written method. The books goes through the methods and tells you the language that the schools might be using to describe that particular method.

Each school will do roughly the same things, but not exactly, and not exactly at the same time. Children will have preferred methods, and be allowed to use those, as well as being encouraged to move on to the next methods as their understanding develops.

[AllButterShortbread]

irvine the op is asking about ks1 sats so yr2 not yr6.

[Norestformrz]

No they don't have to have a calculation policy and if they do it may not be on the website.

[Norestformrz]

"ps. see that times tables are being reintroduced ." No times tables have always been in the National curriculum but from 2020 there will be a national test for children in Y4

[Norestformrz]

"but why do children not have maths text books any more " they may use text books in the classroom but still send home worksheets to practise what has been taught in the classroom

[user789653241]

Ok, sorry, I misunderstood. If it's ks1 sats, then they are more likely not to be taught traditional column methods at that stage. Trying to teach a child who is already struggling with simple calculations in ks1 a methods they haven't been taught at school will only be more confusing.

Answer is very simple. The way they teach at school now is totally different from how you do it or how you have been taught. It's fine to teach her the way you like if she is capable, but if not, you are making it even worse, however good intentions you have. That's why I suggest you check out the school policy.

[Jim999]

OK, probably final message but thought I'd share what I've found out. Firstly KS1 is more of an assessment than an 'exam' just to see where the kids are in terms of learning, it seems schools don't even have to send the results home unless they are actually asked to! Been doing a lot of research online into maths teaching and it seems that it is very fluid now in the early stages with the emphasis being on how numbers work rather than rigid formalised teaching. For example 7+4+3 they would look to see it the child recognises that 7+3 is 10 which makes it much easier.
Finally in terms of being a Grandparent and obviously not always with them to help I have discovered IXL which I'm going to sign her up for. It has a huge array of topics which she can work through but the thing that won me over is that it keeps a records of how she does in each one so all the family can see what she's fine with and what she may not be and what she still needs to do. Also has the advantage that if it uses any 'new' terminology then I can look it up so we can help her with it. Also believe it or not it also has things on there for my 3 year old grandson. Please be assured I am in no way connected to IXL, just seems ideal for what I wanted. That's All Folks.

[user789653241]

My son has been using IXL for over 4 years, and it's a great site. But you need to be careful, they don't teach, they just test your knowledge without any fun factor, and child needs to be very determined if you want to get 100%. It's painfully repetitive. Some will love it like my son, but it may put some children off maths completely.

[user789653241]

What I mean by child needs to be determined, is the fact you have to answer at least 20 questions to get 100%/100 points to master the skill on average, and that's when you answer everything correct without any mistake. If you keep getting wrong and getting right, and getting wrong again, it may make you do similar question over and over it could be up to 100+ questions to master a skill, if she keeps making mistakes, which would be horrible for young children.

[brizzledrizzle]

BBC bitesize is useful

[Jim999]

Hi, re IXL and getting it wrong. One of the main points we will stress is that if they are getting things 'wrong' then they HAVE to tell us so we can help.

[Jim999]

it's the stats part that really appealed to me so we can see exactly where we are with the different topics

[Norestformrz]

"Firstly KS1 is more of an assessment than an 'exam' just to see where the kids are in terms of learning"
If your granddaughter is in Y2 (KS1 is both Year 1 and Y2 ) she will take tests in May (there are two reading tests, two maths papers and an optional spelling grammar and punctuation test).
These will be used by the class teacher as part of the evidence to support their assessment which is reported to the DfE and parents. Children will be assessed as either working towards the expected standard, working at the expected standard or working at greater depth within the expected standard. The reported assessment is used by the DfE to measure progress between Key Stages.
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachmentdata/file/647105/20177to20188teacherassessmenttframeworksatttheenddofkeyystage11_PDFA.pdf

IXL doesn't actually teach and may not use the same terms or methods used in her classroom.

Only the school can tell you how they teach.

The worksheets should reflect work done in the classroom so your granddaughter should know how to approach the work.

[user789653241]

Jim999, I don't know how you see the posts on here, but we all know how the ks1 sats or ks2 sats works. There is nothing new.
We are trying to help, and it's nature of education board. And it's great that you decided to help your grand daughter, but please check with her school how they teach her.
My father is a maths specialist who lectured at uni and colleges. But he wouldn't help my ds how they teach maths in primary these days.

[user789653241]

"it's the stats part that really appealed to me"

Well the thing is, the stats doesn't tell you anything. If you made a mistake, you made a mistake. It doesn't matter if it was careless calculation mistake or mistake by not understanding.

[Jim999]

We'll see.....

[Layla10]

Well I think with a Grandad like you she will do just fine, you sound incredibly supportive and switched on, my parents wouldn't even consider helping my daughter with any school work, she's lucky to have you in her corner : )

I'm sure once you can find out the actual methods the school are using to teach maths, with your support your granddaughter will understand and do really well.

I have a similar situation with my daughter with fractions and division at the moment, she's coming home upset that she doesn't understand and is getting it wrong, being kept in at play time to re do the exercises, according to her the teacher doesn't help her though, she just says do it again, you can do it, daughter ends up in tears apparently because she doesn't understand and teacher tells her to stop crying and just hurry up. Obviously this is my 6 year old's version of things so could be way off. I'm going to ask to speak to her teacher about it next week, the thing I want to know is which methods they're using to teach maths so I can then help dd with it at home. Like you we get homework worksheets, but I need to know the actual methods the teacher is using to teach the maths, otherwise my help will just confuse dd even more.

Our school has no info on it's website about this, so I'll ask exactly which methods they use when I can speak to the teacher next week. If you're not able to have a chat with the teacher after school one day because of work etc, does your granddaughter have a contact book for messages to be sent in? Our school uses these so you can write a message to the teacher about various things, if your school uses contact / message books you could ask which methods they're using that way. One thing I'd say though if you don't already know, is that back in Reception the books were all checked daily by the teachers for any messages. Then in year 1 at our school it became the children's responsibility to hand their books to the teacher in the morning if they had a message from home in it. Initially they were asked by the teacher if anyone had any messages to hand in, but then once they got into the habit the reminders stopped and it was totally up to the child to remember if they had a message in the book and to hand it in. So it does rely on the individual child remembering to hand their book in with the message, otherwise in year 2 it doesn't get seen. I'd tell my dd what I'd written, and make sure she knew it was a positive thing that I wanted to learn how she was doing the maths too so that I could help her : )

[ScreamLikeYouMeanIt]

Hi Jim, don't know if you're still around but I'm a teacher currently teaching Y2's. First of all your grand daughter is going to do absolutely fine in life with supportive parents and grandparents like yourself. Secondly most schools are happy to explain how they're teaching different methods to the children. I would always be happy to have a 5-10 minute chat at the end of the school day when there is a little more time or put it all in a letter to take home.

But to answer your question here and now in by the end of Y2 we have taught the children to add/subtract mentally and using column addition/subtraction. Column method we teach a lot about place value (hundred's tens and ones) so mentioning this to your grand daughter may jog her memory. When teaching mentally we encourage the children to remember number bonds and use fingers to help them. We tell the child to 'hold the larger number in their head' and then count on/back.

Fraction wise we spend time using concrete objects, understanding the concept of part and whole and how a fractions are equal parts of the whole. For example introducing quarters by giving them a toy pizza and asking them to share it fairly amongst four of them. We then move on to them being able to shade in fractions of shapes by teaching the idea that the whole (ie the shape) has to be divided by the bottom number (denominator) and then multiplied by the top number (numerator). We use shapes that are segmented to start with as it is easy for them to see the visual representation of it. Only then do we move on the finding fractions of numbers, using the same method as above. If we asked them to find 3/4 of 20 for instance we would encourage them to count out 20 cubes/counters and share them into 4 equal groups. They would then put 3 of these 4 groups together and count how many are there.

We also teach division by the concept of sharing into groups. Long division and multiplication aren't massively focused on till KS2. The 2,5 and 10x tables are taught by counting in 2,5,and 10's an then practising the quick recall of 5x10=50 for example.

Hope this helps clear up any confusion on teaching methods if this reaches you. You are right, I can see how it is a minefield for anyone who wishes and is able to help but has been out of the education system for any length of time.

[ScreamLikeYouMeanIt]

To clarify, number bonds are the quick recall addition facts to 20. E.g. 14+6 = 20, 7+3=10 etc

[ScreamLikeYouMeanIt]

Also for those working at a deeper level we move on to being able to divide by counting how many times the divisor goes into it. E.g for 40 divided by 5 we would teach counting up to 40 in 5's and seeing how many 5's we counted.