My planning changed enormously over the years; mainly because I found that what I had been given to use, didn't work (and frankly, did my head in 🤯)

This month in my 'Essentials' membership we're focusing upon 'Planning'; specifically 'Long' and 'Medium-Term'.

Each year I'd experience the same problems with my 'Long-Term Planning' (I've taught 4-11 year olds and it happened in every year group):

• I'd get 'left behind' in my long-term plans as the terms were all different lengths and events like Christmas and Sports Day in the summer meant that my timetable changed
• I was aiming to make sure my children were secure before moving on, so I spent longer on things than I was supposed to
• I'd expected/hoped they would remember what they'd learned last time and invariably they didn't, so, instead of moving on, we had to revisit most of it all over again...

My Medium-Term wasn't any more successful:

Most approaches I was given to medium-term planning over the years were just the long-t...

Lately I've noticed a significant rise in the number of posts where practitioners express their concern that their school has moved towards what is being described as a very 'formal' style of teaching with 4-5 year olds.

This is, and should be, of great concern to everyone involved not only in the sector, but also achieving the invested in the very best outcomes for all children.

The first question is 'Why is this happening?'

We rarely give 'why?' the attention it deserves and, as a result, we react and expend precious energy feeling upset, frustrated, unheard and helpless. The outcome is that many then put their head down and get on with it.

This changes nothing.

When we seek to understand 'why' something is happening, we not only conserve our energies but we can begin to see how to navigate these tricky waters.

Why might school leaders be choosing to do this?

• The belief that, the earlier you begin, the higher standards and better progress you create
• 'Gaps' in fluency
...

Would you like to know the BIGGEST mistake I ever made in teaching ‘Number Sense’ to my 3-7 year olds?

(And to be fair, I couldn’t have NOT made is because I hadn’t been given the right tools to teach any differently. I didn’t know what I didn’t know.)

I had always believed that it was counting that would enable my children to make sense of how numbers are made up of ‘parts’, how place value (including ‘teen numbers’ of course) work and then calculate (add, subtract, multiply, divide, work with fractions and more). 

Every course, every book, every scheme had taught me this. For over 20 YEARS!

So that’s what I focused upon.

I taught my children to ‘count all’, then ‘count on’. (Whilst at the same time teaching them automatic recall of number bonds without context and by rote, day in and day out).

The result?

I created children whose only strategy for adding and subtracting was to count in 1s on their fingers or ‘head bob’ along an imaginary number line. They took this appr...

(Click on 'download external images to see full post)

This term, teaching 'Numbers 1-5' is the focus in many of our most well-known Maths schemes. 

BUT what if you feel that your children already have this knowledge and are ready to move on?

From the posts shared on social media groups so far, there are many of you feeling a little conflicted.

Can you relate?

• You know that a deep understanding of these numbers is essential for children to progress with fluency and confidence
• BUT, you may also feel they're ready to move on. You've done so much work on 1-5 last term and you're worried they will become bored and disengaged?

How do you 'square this circle'?

If this resonates with you then read on...

(IMPORTANT: What I'll share with you here will be relevant to you if you teach 3-6 year olds+ too).

To know whether your children really ARE ready to move on, your first question needs to be:

• What are the key skills children with fluency and mastery of numbers
...

So what is subitising and how does it differ to counting? 

These was a question I asked myself, for a long time.

Subitising is our ability to know ’how many?’ without counting.

It turns out that this is a skill we’re all born with. From a very young age we recognise certain patterns of ‘number’ such as the ‘3’ made up my the human face (but of course we don’t think of it as ‘three’ because that’s a word we haven’t learned yet). We also know when there are more and less of something (such a pieces of fruit for us to eat). This skill of recognise a number pattern (in the case of our main carer’s face) and a larger quantity of food are driven by our primal instinct to keep us alive.

‘Counting’ (for cardinality - to find out ‘how many?’) by contrast is a human creation.

The symbols and names we used were invented and evolved over tens of thousands of years. Our ancestors operated in a world without number names or a counting system and definitely still used ‘number sense’ every d...

It doesn't matter which Maths scheme you use (or whether you have a scheme in place or not), what matters is what YOU as the educator know (your subject knowledge) and understand (your pedagogy) about the Maths you're teaching and the ways it's most effectively taught.

Think of a scheme as like a recipe book, whereas investing in your knowledge and skills is like going on a cooking course.

Simply buying the latest recipe books will not make you a better cook.

Teaching Maths effectively is just the same.

EYMaths isn't another 'recipe book' instead we aim to offer you the very BEST cookery course you could wish for.

So let's start uncovering what 'you didn't know you didn't know' about teaching 'Composition of Number'.

Understanding the 'Composition of a Number' is what leads to our ability to add, subtract, multiply and divide. It's vital we as educators know this is the destination or we may, mistakenly miss that we're providing a vital step here in their mathematical progressi...

Can you relate?

You have to have been a practitioner yourself to understand the strange, wonderful (and often overwhelming) experience of spending time in your setting without the children.

For those of us who have an extended time away from the children over the summer break, one of the first things on our minds is setting up our environment for the year ahead.

This can typically take one of two forms.

Option 1: You remain in the same room 

or 

Option 2: You inherit a completely new space

Let’s look at option 1 first:

My initial reaction to this scenario was one of total depression and overwhelm.

All year I’d ‘hide’ things that needed properly sorting out promising myself I’d make time during the term to do it and then not. I'd then vow that, once the holidays came, I’d tackle it. 

Come the summer holidays, I’d walk in (with my favourite coffee which I may actually get to drink hot for once!)) and I’d just stand in the middle of the room and look around wondering

'Whe...