At Waterford West State School, mathematics is an integral and highly valued component of the curriculum. Students identify and explore mathematics concepts through active investigation of real-life situations involving mathematics. They understand that mathematics can help them to make meaning of their world.
When learning about mathematics, students recognise that there are particular ways of working with concepts in mathematics. Students also recognise that there are particular facts and procedures required for knowing and understanding in mathematics. Students and teachers value mathematics as a way of investigating, thinking, reasoning and relating to real-life situations.
Mathematics is a way of making sense of the world. The mathematics Key Learning Area helps students to know about mathematics, know how to do mathematics, and know when and where to use it. All people need the capacity to make sense of and be critical about numerical information. To achieve this they need a disposition to think and act mathematically, and the confidence and intuition to apply mathematical concepts to explore and solve everyday problems that confront them. Problem solving is a key priority at Waterford West State School and students need to be proficient in the steps to being a good problem solver.
Skills needed for mathematics include mental computation and deep understandings of how numbers work. They also require meta-cognitive/higher order skills such as reflection, analysis, estimation, justification, synthesis and communication skills. These skills are needed to describe each of these in appropriate language and format, and are learned through working mathematically. The ways of working will be used to provide guidance of what students will be expected to do.
At Waterford West State School, mathematics is seen as a dynamic field of study. Students from Prep to Year Seven will be led to discover the power and place of mathematics, both as a discipline, as it relates to learning in each of the other Key Learning Areas, and in our everyday encounters at work and play outside school.