Mathematics

The Faculty of Mathematics is housed in a purpose built six classroom block to the front of the school. Every classroom is fitted with a computer and interactive whiteboard to help teachers to demonstrate and involve students in lessons.

Staffing

We currently have eight full time Mathematics teachers as listed below.

Ms Suzanne Shaw   (Head of Mathematics), Ms Johanne Langdale (2nd in Faculty), Mr Tony Garland (Lead Teacher), Mrs Dawn Abbass (Numeracy Co-ordinater) Ms Zaheda Patel, Miss Claire Lancaster, Mrs Leanne Thompson and Mr Simon Anderson.

Curriculum Overview

At both Key stage 3 and Key stage 4 students enjoy 3 x 1 hour lessons each week. At Key stage 3 we follow the New Curriculum. This ensures that students experience a variety of lessons and learn how to develop skills such as reasoning and communication amongst many others. We also look to use many resources such as Bowland maths as a method of introducing different concepts and ideas into the lesson as well as ICT. We are also looking at ways that we can introduce APP (Assessing Pupil Progress) at Key stage 3 in order to ensure that students levels are as secure as possible.

At key stage 4 we follow the modular Edexcel scheme with examinations currently taking place throughout year 10 and year 11. The examination timetable for 2008-09 is as follows;

November 2009 – Year 11 sit Module 1 (worth 20%)
March 2010 – Year 10 sit Module 2 (worth 30%)
May/June 20010 – Year 11 sit Terminal examinations (worth 50%).

We also have 90 students in Year 10 sitting a GCSE in Statistics and will be looking to filter this through to other students next year. This involves completing one piece of coursework (worth 20%) and one examination.

Curriculum Enhancement

This year we have been looking to enhance the curriculum as much as possible by introducing out of lesson activities where possible. We hope that Year 7 students will attend a ‘Math-a-Magic’ day at the Catalyst Scientific Discovery Centre in Widnes.

Useful Websites

As a school we have access to a number of websites that can be used by students at home. The sites at the right of the page are useful to parents also and some have a specific parents link.

Mymaths.co.uk - Username: palatine Password: diamond