How are your Y1 mathematicians doing?

[Oilyvoir]

Thought I would start a thread in a similar vein to the reading one. I am beyond frustrated. My boy is a late summer born. His reading is OK to good (see above thread) but his writing is shocking - think summer born boy! Since being little it has been obvious that his 'thing' is maths and science, particularly science. At not quite 2 his nursery pointed out how mathematically aware he was when he was standing in a chair and said to his key worker 'I'm taller than you' . Could count to 10 by 2 - so nicely with it rather than gifted. He finished his nursery year exceeding expectations in speech and language and maths. Reception was a bit of a disaster as apart from covid, the teacher was very formal and writing obsessed which didn't suit little one at all. For context I am a specialist maths teacher at primary level so I know what the Y1 maths looks like. During lockdown he learnt to count in 2s 5s and 10s to 100 - this is an end of Y1 concept and he was not yet 5 when he mastered it. More recently he learnt odd and even numbers from the 100 square in the classroom which had odd and even labelled at the top of each column - no input from his teacher or me on this but he can say whether any number to 100 is odd or even. He knows his number bonds to 10 and various other end of Y1 concepts - so not gifted but definitely gets maths. I have becoming more and more suspicious he is actually in the bottom group for maths - he goes out with his group every day with the TA for maths. Parents evening tomorrow so will be bringing up with his teacher. I am pretty sure that his school is so writing obsessed that he is in this group on the basis that his number formation is immature. With my professional hat on, I'm pretty convinced he has the potential to be exceeding expectations by the end of the year.

Sometimes kids learn to parrot sequences of numbers rather than actually understand the concept of value. If he's needing extra help now it might be because he got away with "faking it" for so long

I'm fairly sure my DD's number formation is poor. Her teacher described her as being strong in maths without any reference to her digits being back to front etc.

Any chance the maths group is working on greater depth skills? My elder DD had some group sessions with a TA for that, albeit in year 2.

He's absolutely not faking it. Children who struggle with maths generally don't stare at a number square working out why this column says odd and this one even. He's also a naturally problem solver regularly saying things like ' when I am 15 my sister will be 13' and knows that 6 +5 must be 11 because 5+5 is 10. I don't hothouse him - the only thing I insist on is that he reads every day but at bedtime he demands I ask him maths questions and as a maths teacher how can I resist? Yhis is how I know about the odd and even numbers. I randomly asked him for an odd number and he told me and I asked few more, all right and i said 'how do you know that' and he told me that when he sits on the carpet he looks at the 100 square and the columns (not his word) say odd and even and he just noticed the pattern.

It may be they he’s in a group doing extension activities. But I thought my year 1 could do all of that too very securely but was told that ‘maths doesn’t come naturally’ to my child the other day in my parents conversation - which didn’t sound great. But then told I was reading too much into that and they are ‘doing fine’ when I questioned it. It’s a complete mystery to me as I do think my child picks up everyday maths concepts easily and seems to apply them well.

Why because he goes out with the ta does that mean he is bottom group ?
This could be the top group doing extension activities.

I have becoming more and more suspicious he is actually in the bottom group for maths - he goes out with his group every day with the TA for maths

I don't think you can judge based on this.

@starrynight19

Why because he goes out with the ta does that mean he is bottom group ? This could be the top group doing extension activities.

I teach year 1. This is what happens in my class. The children who need support receive the support but my TA or I also take out the exceeding group most days to complete the extension challenge as it's much easier to concentrate in a quiet room.

Why don't you ask?

No it's not the top group doing extension - the names of the children in his group have given it away. He knows exactly who gets the 'hard' work. But I am asking his teacher tonight!

It's harder to know how they are doing for maths than reading and we haven't had parents evening yet. DD recognises odds and evens, knows number bonds to 20 and can count in 2s. I have absolutely no idea what this means in terms of expected progress though. Sometimes when she is 'teaching' me maths she gets me to do 'stretching' questions so I'm assuming that means she gets those at school but she tells me they all do.

My DD is Yr 1 and is at a similar level to your son but is one of the oldest. At parents evening the teacher was complimentary about her maths ability so I think your son must be doing really well.

Her school do Singapore maths which is a whole class approach with quite a lot of focus on the verbal I think. However I think they do some individual assessments with the children to check how they are doing. She gets activities for home via Maths with Parents which are often very easy but occasionally they have extension tasks from NRich which are more challenging.

I think you need to see what is actually happening at parents evening.

I think it is a case of just relax, let him be (he sounds happy, challenged and confident) and enjoy the fact your son is doing well. As a teacher, you will know how hard it is for parents to see their child struggling. Going out in a group is not going to kill him. Perhaps it is for extension activities. The school I teach out does this so I would go with an open mind rather than ready to pounce on the poor teacher!
Perhaps it is to work on motor skills to help him with the transition from Reception to Year 1 and formal learning.

As a TA In yr1 we rotate who comes out with me or the teacher so sometimes I have tops and sometimes I don't. Some of the concepts of yr1 maths are very challenging, designed to make them think and is all about problem solving. Is it possible your ds is not using his rote-learning skills to solve problems? Even if a child knows their 2, 5 and 10 times tables it wouldn't necessarily put them in the top group in our class, Having said that, if a child 'gets' maths they would be challenged regardless of what group they were in. Good luck with the chat.

Sorry, ignore, hadn't read your second post.

He is probably in the extension group, but its worth asking. Our local school does this as the inputs can sometimes be boring doe these children so it means they aren't held back by those of a different pace.

Worth mentioning that there are two SEN children in my nephews maths extension group, it's not always easy to tell who will be good at maths, some children just get it. On the other hand, learning and being able to do things at home is very different to in class at school, where they have to be more independent. Ask the teacher and see what reasons she/he has for putting him in that group, it's likely to be deliberate but it would be good if they let you know so you can support his learning more easily.

I was about to say the same as @happychristmastreerex My DD in year 1 has an EHCP and well behind (2+ years) in most things except for maths. Maths she wipes the floor and is incredible. There's another little boy also in her maths group with a very similar profile to her. Just because the names in the group are kids known to have SEN or not necessarily excelling in general doesn't mean they are not good in maths and it's automatically the low achievers.

If it's that much of an issue then ask the school.

I’m curious as to how parents evening went?

I’ve been reflecting on parents evening and whilst my child is (very) bright and learns things quickly (I may be biased ), I’m now not entirely sure that she is yet showing mathematical thinking. I’ve had a look at some of the activities on the NRich website and if that is what maths mastery looks like, then I can see that my child might not be applying their knowledge to those sort of tasks (some of the explaining the rationale aspects seems tricky to me and I have a first class degree in a maths related discipline!). However, It’s given me lots of ideas for fun games and activities we can do at home though and I fully believe that those sort of skills can be developed just like any other. Hopefully a combo of their maths knowledge some further development of problem solving skills will really help! I should add the school haven’t said their is any problem with their maths ability as such but I firmly believe that maths is one of those subjects where building confidence early is really critical and that includes the teachers having high expectations / belief in them.

Number bonds to 10 is reception i think.
Our school the kids were quite ahead at maths making my summer born maybe look worse.
Y1 and 2 maths are quite a jump mainly the add and subtracting. And yes i guess it's harder for the youngest who are also struggling probably to write at all at 5.0yo. Let alone by 5.5yo doing the numbers and crossing some ones off to subtract etc. Dc1 ended up.with scraping ito the not met for year one which was a surprise as definitely more capable. By y4 they did a test against national expectations and came out as top 1/4 of the yeargroup. But we did a lot of work at home during year 1. I think with so many kids it's very hard to assess them at a correct level.
Imo they would be better to not do as much add/sub in yr 1 and go straight to column in yr 2. I know they want them to understand but dc was 5 and just didnt get it.

Any update on parents evening?

Well I had a productive 10 minute chat with the teacher. She seems lovely. Said that they don't ability group as such. They all have access to the same learning (which I was relieved about as it's a very old school type school) as they are following White Rose. She did say he is in a group with the children who are reluctant to put pen to paper which he definitely is but not because he is a low attainer - more that he is a very young in the year boy (5 years and 3 months) - but i suspect most of the others will be the lower attainers. She said it was difficult to work out what he knows and can do because he is so reluctant to put pen to paper but this is improving. So I definitely got the impression she had no idea what he could do and if I hadn't spoken to her, he would have been pigeon holed as a lower attainer. Anyway today he has come home with 'the harder homework because I'm good at maths'.

My sons been able to do what yours can for ages and he is 5 today. He has an autistic brother (7) who is obsessed with numbers and literally quizzes him all the time and sets him questions (as well as me and his dad lol) but his teacher has said that he tries to guess the answer to maths questions and if he doesn't already know the answer he won't try, so I'm trying to get him to use his fingers to count which he has been doing lately which is good Glad you sorted it with the teacher though. Doing your job you'd probably love my boys especially the oldest lol, I've started to sweat at some of the maths questions he's been asking me, I'm terrible at maths haha

Keepdistance - neither EYFS or Y1 mention number bonds to 10 specifically. Y1 is know and use number bonds up to 20 as expected and to have started to memorise some of them is exceeding. I'm really not sure how you distinguish between know and memorise! It can of course be taught to most Y1 children with constant daily repetition but not many have it this early in the year.

Heartofglass - you can't fault the power of siblings! Younger ones definitely aspire to do the things their older siblings do! If your little one isn't so keen on counting out an answer, try buying him a set of numicon (you only need a few so could probably pick up cheaply on ebay). If he learnt to calculate with these, he would see the number patterns and relationships straight away bypassing the counting on stage which is not efficient anyway. My little one is actually my grandson whom I parent. We are not biologically related as his mum is my adopted daughter. In a way, I am more delighted he is good at maths as it's nothing to do with my genes! (his mum struggles with maths but is bright in other ways but his dad whom he has never met was apparently an A* student in maths and science)

My husband did a maths a level but GCSE was as far as I got and that was a struggle
He definitely copies his big brother, he had him counting before he could talk properly if that makes sense lol. He uses Num icons in school, I'll have to see if I can get some, thanks

The teacher is not a mind reader. She will only know what he can do by what he says and records. It's very common for children to achieve differently in the classroom in a large setting with 30 children than in a 1:1 setting at home.
My advice is to relax and work on his recording so this is representative of his skills.
Does he put his hand up? Does he respond if asked a direct question? These would be areas to work on as well.