Regents Review Spring '16

The Regents Review Spring 2016

Departmental News Mathematics

Year 11 continue to raise their game in Mathematics

Intermediate Maths Challenge – February 5th 2015 The UK Mathematics Trust (UKMT) is a registered charity whose aim is to advance the education of children and young people in mathematics. The UKMT organises national mathematics competitions and other mathematical enrichment activities for 11-18 year old UK school pupils. It was established in 1996 and last academic year over 600,000 pupils from 4000 schools took part in the three individual challenges, the UK's biggest national mathematics competition. Sixty students from Year 9 and 10 (9BW Mr Hayward; 10BW Mr Wharton) were chosen to represent our school in this competition, answering 25 challenging questions set by the University of Leeds and the Actuary Profession. Congratulations to all our students who were chosen to sit the paper and we look forward to receiving the results!

Maths teachers: present and future? As part of our aim to increase student led learning, Mr Wharton has been encouraging students to lead parts of lessons, thus promoting peer to peer explanation. One such student is Mateusz Burek (pictured below) who has a real talent for teaching aspects of Mathematics which the students have now named ‘Maths with Matti’.

Following the improvements made in the October 2015 mock examinations, our Year 11 have continued to shine, making further gains in their December examinations, increasing the pass rate to 61%. We still have a long way to go to beat 2014’s record- breaking 79% pass rate, but we know Year 11 can do it! The majority of Year 11 are nearing the end of a seemingly never ending list of topics and will soon be sharpening their focus on examination technique through a number of walking talking mocks as well as a Pre-public examination in March. We ask students to ensure they are working independently outside of lesson time to work on their individual areas of weakness and recommend the following

websites to this end: www.mymaths.co.uk

www.corbettmaths.com www.hegartymaths.com www.mathsmadeeasy.co.uk

Intervention With the lighter mornings that February brings, we were pleased to restart our popular breakfast revision ‘Pi club’. Well done to all students who come along on these mornings for revision (and a hot chocolate with a pastry or two!). Pi club for Year 11 will continue to run from 7.50am – 8.20am until the public exams in the summer. Mr Keenan and Mrs Keenan have designated times to meet individually with students needing practice on their examination technique and/or key topic areas. Every available moment of time is utilised, including tutor time, to boost students’ confidence and attainment in mathematics and we are very appreciative of the many positive comments we receive from students and parents.

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