It’s time to ‘Catch Up’ … catch up with colleagues to re-establish, and possibly re-think, why we do what we do as a Maths Team.

Kangaroo Maths has always aimed to support colleagues with principle-led approaches to planning, teaching and assessing mathematics. Eighteen years later, as schools recover from a third lockdown, it seems timely to share some of the thinking behind Kangaroo Maths. The Plan-Teach-Assess ideas and resources developed over this time are more relevant than ever as schools think about prioritising, and possibly re-designing, their curriculum and pedagogy to respond to the lockdowns.

The Kangaroo Maths resources and ideas are primarily influenced by the work of:

  • Malcolm Swan (Eight principles for effective teaching of mathematics)
  • John Mason and Anne Watson (Mathematical Thinkers)
  • Dylan Wiliam (Inside the Black Box / Embedding Formative Assessment)

They had the impact of improving results in our school from below 50% %A*-C to over 80 %A*-C, and tripled the number of A-level classes needed to cope with the demand of more students wishing to study A-level Mathematics. We simply wanted to share things that had worked well for our students with other schools.

Curriculum coherence

The Kangaroo Maths schemes of work are based on eleven stages providing a model of progression from KS1 to KS4.  Stages 1 to 6 are based on the content of the  National Curriculum KS1 and KS2 Programmes of Study. Stages 7 to 11 integrate the content of the National Curriculum KS3 and KS4 Programmes of Study with the structure of the DfE GCSE mathematics: subject content and assessment objectives.

For information about the content of the stages and units, please see the medium-term plans and the big picture progression map below. The diagram here also provides a useful overview of the design and structure for each of the secondary schemes of work, and their consequent pitch in terms of GCSE grades (based on an original OCR diagram).

The secondary schemes of work are based on 7 maths lessons per fortnight, with at least 35 ‘quality teaching’ weeks per year. However, the curriculum model in your school, the place of deliberate practice, and the time it takes students to master concepts will all influence the reality.

Rather than Kangaroo Maths being a scheme to ‘implement’, the idea was always to provide colleagues with a starting point for discussions about planning, teaching and assessing … plus also hopefully reducing workload. For example, the schemes of work provide a suggested five/eleven year structure for departments to work on to develop their own curriculum.  It’s great some departments choose to use the schemes of work in the format they are provided on the website. It’s also great some departments use them flexibly to fit their context; e.g. adjusted to fit the amount of curriculum time for mathematics per fortnight, or simply to enhance their current provision. The schemes of work also provide ‘possible’ key learning points and ‘suggested’ activities to support colleagues plan lessons rather than start from a blank piece of paper. These suggestions are intended to empower colleagues rather than be a straitjacket that colleagues must ‘implement’ – as can be the case with the structure and design of some schemes.

Curriculum prioritisation

Within each stage, 13 ‘Build-a-Mathematician (BAM)’ indicators are identified to represent the minimum expected outcomes by the end of the stage, critical in developing conceptual understanding and essential for pupils to make progress to the next stage (see the BAM summary below).

In the current landscape, the BAM Indicators could also provide a useful framework for schools to reflect on:

  • What has been taught during lockdown?
  • Do we need to adapt current curriculum plans for Terms 5 and 6?

Each BAM indicator also has an associated BAM Task to help assess and build a picture of a mathematician. In the current landscape, the BAM Tasks could be useful for schools to use to assess:

  • What has been taught LEARNT during lockdown?
  • How secure and deep is students’ understanding?

The carefully crafted questions in the BAM Tasks have been designed to unpick:

  • Fluency
  • Reasoning
  • Application
  • Misunderstanding
  • Problem solving

Students really need to think deeply if they are to be successful with most or all of the questions on a BAM Task – this is intentional.  Being successful at the fluency and misconception questions (or now referred to ‘what it is’ and ‘what it’s not’ questions by ‘teaching for mastery’ advocates) are useful indicators of the security of students’ understanding.

Coming up …

Of course, let’s not forget the words of Dylan Wiliam:

‘Pedagogy trumps curriculum. Or more precisely, pedagogy is curriculum, because what matters is how things are taught, rather than what is taught’

So, Part 2 of this blog will explore curriculum coherence on a micro-level by exploring the structure, and supporting resources, within a unit …

All the resources mentioned in this blog can be found in ‘Kenny’s Pouch’ on the Kangaroo Maths website. KM+ provides a wealth of further resources to support teachers and leaders with Plan-Teach-Assess:

Useful documents