Teachers should I be worried about this

[cassgate]

After some advice from any teachers or teaching assistants please.

Have just come back from parents evening for year 3 ds and am somewhat worried about his maths progress. I was worried at the end of year 2 as when we got his report in July he had seemingly only made 1 sub level progress in a year ( was a 1a in maths at end of year 1 and 2c at end of year 2). I went to see the yr 2 teacher in July and she said that his problem solving was the problem in particular using the correct operation. She said his number facts were secure (number bonds and 2 5 and 10 times table) but he now needed to use the facts he knows to problem solve. I went away and did some work with him over the summer to rectify this and I have seen a massive improvement, not just in this but in all his maths work. However, at parents evening I have been told he is still a level 2c. I asked if there was any area that was weak that was causing the problem and was told no not really that it was not unusual for there to be a dip after the summer holidays and it takes a while to get back on track and make progress. He is in a target group that have support from the hlta but they want him to be less reliant on her and become more independant in his work. I don't know if I should go back and have another chat with the teacher or if I should leave things as they are and wait and see what progress has been made at the next parents evening which will be in February. My main concern is the fact that only 1 sub level progress has been made since end of year 1. A brief out line of what I have seen him do independantly in the last 2 weeks.


Can partition and add 2 digit numbers ( including carrying over lots of 10)
Can partition and subtract 2 digit numbers
Knows his 2, 3, 4, 5 and 10 times table ( random recall not just rote learnt)
Can problem solve using addition and subtraction confidently not so confident with using multiplication facts that he knows
Knows number bonds and uses them to help with addition and subtraction. e.g knows that if he wants to add 8 or 9 to a number he should just add 10 and take away 1 or 2.
Can tell the time to the hour, 1/4 past and 1/2 past and knows digital clock equivalents
Knows what regular and irregular polygons are.
Knows the names of all shapes up to a decagon.

Any advice gratefully received.

[toomuchicecream]

The teacher is absolutely right that there's normally a dip/plateau over the summer holidays so I wouldn't worry that his level hasn't changed yet. However, I would be extremely concerned that he only made 1 sub level of progress in year 2 and the school didn't pick up on this and put support in place to address this. But that's history so there's not a lot of point in going to see the school about that. The school should have identified him as a cause for concern and have put measures into place to support him and to make sure he makes up that lost ground.

If I was in your position I'd make an appointment to go and see the teacher after half term and explain that you'd like advice about how to support him at home - after all, the year 2 teacher gave you some ideas and you acted on them, so it's perfectly reasonable to ask the year 3 teacher for ideas.

For me, the big thing that's missing from your list is division. I always suggest that you teach the division facts at the same time as the multiplication ones (ie 3 x 4, 4 x 4, 3 divided by 4, 4 divided by 3) - that way it's not as daunting. Also, you can draw arrays (ie 3 rows of 4 dots or 4 rows of 3 dots) to represent the multiplication facts, or make them using pasta or lego or whatever in which case you can move them apart into groups to represent division. A lot of children find it helps to make it visual/practical.

How confident is he with all the different vocabulary for the 4 number operations? It would be worth checking if he knows that minus=take away=subtract=subtraction=less than=decrease by etc etc.

While you're doing division you might as well cover fractions as the 2 are closely related - preferably with cakes, smarties, biscuits, pizzas, bars of chocolate etc. He also needs to be able to tell the time to the nearest 5 minutes.

And if he needs to work more on problem solving then I can't recommend nrich.maths.org/frontpage highly enough. A fantastic site with loads of great ideas for both of you.