It All Adds Up

All year groups have been focussing on the additive structure. Some have been exploring and understanding two main structures: the aggregation structure, the augmentation structure, and others have linked repeated addition to multiplication.

Getting Feet Wet with Numbers - Nursery

In Nursery the children have been exploring rhymes such as, the 5 little ducks’ in order to begin to explore the context for subtraction as reduction (take away), using a ‘first…, then…, now…’ story representation.

A Theatre of Operations - Year 1

Year 1 children have explored the language of additive structures, including Addend, Sum Minuend, Subtrahend and Difference. They have effectively and confidently used this language to explain equations that involve ‘first, then, now’ stories with addition equations involving addition and subtraction. They can explain what the = symbols stands for and even distinguish an equation from an expression. They have used this abstract notation (+, − and =); and explored the inverse nature of the two operations.

Precise and Concise Calculating - Year 3

During Year 3’s term they have been manipulating the additive relationship and securing mental calculation.  

Diennes and number lines were used to expose the structure of the mathematics but also skills such as number bonds to ten were used to support efficient calculating. Here you can see informal notations by the pupils to make sensible choices about calculating efficiently rather than relying on formal (singular) methods.

Seeing Proper Through the Bars - Year 6

Year 5 have been using their knowledge of additive structures to enable them to explain the relationship between repeated addition of a proper fraction and multiplication of fractions (unit fractions). They have used bar models as the visual representation and have been encouraged to explore efficient mental calculations before understanding written calculations, to ensure efficiency.