Helping with Maths
Times tables:
In addition to encouraging your child to practise their Going for Gold, Times Tables Rockstars is a fun and addictive way for your child to practise their times tables facts.
At Bowsland, every child has access to TTRockstars. Each child has their own personal login and can access different games to test their understanding of a range of times table and the corresponding division.
Once logged in, pupils can play independently, challenge friends, play in a group in the arenas and participate in whole school battles. Our Lower School also have access to Numbots via the TTRockstars website.
The Four Calculations:
Below are the links to our calculation policy. These documents allow you to see how we teach the four calculations (addition, subtraction, multiplication and division) in school, so that you can support your child with these methods at home.
Bowsland Green Calculation policy – Addition and Subtraction
Bowsland Green Calculation policy – Multiplication and Division
Practical ideas to help your child at home:
Reception:
- Counting rhymes.
- Counting everyday objects at home e.g. fruit, socks, toys.
- Adding one more/ less to groups of objects.
- Talk about the position of things using prepositions such as: on, next to, etc.
- Use the language of measurement in context – heavy, light, empty, long etc.
- Choose a shape of the week e.g. cylinder. Look for this shape in the environment (tins, candles etc).
- Make a model using boxes/containers of different shapes and sizes. Ask your child to describe their model.
Key Stage 1:
- Number hunt – noticing numbers in our environment e.g. on doors, car number plates, telephone keypad.
- Using rulers and tape measures to measure the height/length of objects in the home.
- Weighing ingredients for cooking in the kitchen and doubling/halving ingredients.
- Using money.
- Ordering days of the week/months of the year, plotting birthdays on the calendar.
- Using a variety of mathematical words in everyday contexts e.g. more than, bigger, less than, take away, subtract, difference etc.
- Counting in 2’s, 5’s, 10’s and 3’s.
- Using number lines to add and subtract.
- Reviewing number bonds to 20 by playing ‘ping pong’. You say a number, they say the corresponding number back.
- Play ‘guess my shape’. You think of a shape. Your child asks questions to try to identify it but you can only answer ‘yes’ or ‘no’ (e.g. Does it have more than 4 corners? Does it have any curved sides?)
- Practise telling the time with your child.
- Throw 2 dice. Ask your child to find the total of the numbers (+), the difference between them (-) or the product (x).
Key Stage 2:
- Hunt for right angles around your home. Can your child a spot angles bigger (obtuse) or smaller (acute) than a right angle?
- Practise telling the time on digital and analogue clocks
- Weighing ingredients in the kitchen. Adapting recipes for different numbers of people and reading the temperature and time in recipes.
- Budgeting with pocket money. How much more will they need, how much will be left?
- Use a TV guide. Ask your child to work out the length of their favourite programmes.
- Give your child a number fact (e.g. 6+3=9). Ask them what else they can find out from this fact (e.g. 6+3=9, 9-6=3, 60+30=90, 500+300=900). You can do this with multiplication facts too.
- Measuring and comparing heights e.g. thinking about how much taller/smaller people are in the family.
- Weighing fruit and vegetables when shopping.
- Thinking about sale prices. How much will items cost if they are reduced by 25% in a sale? If something is buy one, get one free, how much is each item worth?
- Creating symmetrical patterns when drawing or painting.
- Review calculation methods – these are extremely important for many areas of the curriculum.
Here are some useful websites you can use with your child at home:
http://www.primarygames.com/math.php
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/ks1/maths/
http://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/ks2/maths/
http://www.mathschamps.co.uk/#home
Going for Gold
Below are the resources to help your child in their mission of “Going for Gold” here at Bowsland Green.
Questions
White
4 White – 2 times tables out of order
5 White – 5 times tables out of order
6 White – 10 times tables out of order
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Yellow
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Turquiose
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Silver
Gold
Answers
Beige
Yellow
Orange
Pink
Red
Cream
Brown
Green
Turquiose
Blue
Grey
Purple
Black
Bronze
Silver
Gold