Below is the minimum content for Mathematics and Numeracy(KS2 Maths) in the Northern Ireland Key Stage 2 Curriculum. The Curriculum Minimum Content is the skills, understanding and overall level of knowledge to be developed in each area.
The points below should give you an outline of what skills are expected from your child in Key Stage 2. This is what the AQE and PPTC Northern Ireland Transfer Tests will be based on.
PROCESSES IN MATHEMATICS
Making and Monitoring Decisions
Pupils should be enabled to:
- take increasing responsibility for selecting and using the materials and the mathematics required for their work;
- identify and obtain the information required for a task, suggesting appropriate sources to find the information;
- plan and organise their work, learning to work systematically;
- develop a range of strategies for problem solving, looking for ways to overcome difficulties.
Communicating Mathematically
Pupils should be enabled to:
- understand mathematical language and use it to discuss their work and explain their thinking;
- compare their ideas and methods of working with others;
- interpret situations mathematically using appropriate symbols or diagrams;
- present information and results clearly.
Mathematical Reasoning
Pupils should be enabled to:
- recognise general patterns and relationships and make predictions about them;
- ask and respond to open-ended questions and explain their thinking;
- understand and make general statements;
- check results and consider whether they are reasonable.
NUMBER
Understanding Number and Number Notation
Pupils should be enabled to:
- count, read, write and order whole numbers;
- develop an understanding of place value up to two decimal places;
- use this to multiply and divide numbers by 10 and 100;
- estimate and approximate to gain an indication of the size of a solution to a calculation or problem;
- understand and use vulgar fractions, decimal fractions and percentages and explore the relationships between them;
- understand and use negative numbers in context.
Patterns, Relationships and Sequences in Number
Pupils should be enabled to:
- explore and predict patterns and sequences of whole numbers;
- follow and devise rules for generating sequences;
- understand and use multiples and factors and the terms prime, square and cube;
- appreciate inverse operations;
- interpret, generalise and use simple relationships expressed in numerical, spatial and practical situations;
- understand and use simple function machines;
- understand that a letter can stand for an unknown number.
Operations and their Applications
Pupils should be enabled to:
- develop strategies to add and subtract mentally;
- know the multiplication facts up to 10 x 10;
- engage in a range of activities to develop understanding of the four operations of number;
- appreciate the use of brackets; add and subtract with up to two decimal places;
- multiply and divide decimals by whole numbers; use these operations to solve problems.
Money
Pupils should be enabled to:
- use the four operations to solve problems involving money;
- discuss the value of money, how to keep money safe, ways in which goods can be paid for and the need for budgeting;
- be able to plan and think ahead in terms of saving and spending money;
- prioritise spending with a limited supply of money;
- understand how to access best buys;
- discuss foreign currency including the Euro.
MEASURES
Pupils should be enabled to:
- develop skills in estimation of length, ‘weight’, volume/capacity, time, area and temperature;
- appreciate important ideas about measurement, including the continuous nature of measurement and the need for appropriate accuracy;
- understand the relationship between units and convert one metric unit to another; use the four operations to solve problems;
- calculate perimeter and the areas and volumes of simple shapes;
- understand and use scale in the context of simple maps and drawings;
- recognise times on the analogue and digital clocks and understand the relationship between the 12 and 24-hour clocks; use timetables.
SHAPE AND SPACE
Exploration of Shape
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Pupils should be enabled to:
- construct a range of regular and irregular 2-D shapes;
- classify these through examination of angles and sides;
- recognise line and rotational symmetry;
- reflect shapes in a line;
- explore tessellations;
- name and describe common 2-D shapes;
- begin to understand congruence in 2-D shapes;
- construct 3-D shapes;
- investigate the number of faces, edges and vertices on these shapes;
- name and describe common 3-D shapes; explore the relationship between 2-D and 3-D shapes.
Position, Movement and Direction
Pupils should be enabled to:
- understand the notion of angle in the context of turning;
- recognise right angles;
- understand clockwise and anti-clockwise;
- know the eight points of the compass;
- use logo to understand movement and turning;
- be introduced to a programming language and use it to create pictures and patterns and to generate shapes;
- develop language associated with line and angle;
- recognise properties of acute, obtuse and reflex angles;
- investigate angles in triangles and quadrilaterals;
- measure and draw angles up to 360°;
- use co-ordinates to plot and draw shapes in the first quadrant.
HANDLING DATA
Collecting, Representing and Interpreting Data
Pupils should be enabled to:
- collect, classify, record and present data drawn from a range of meaningful situations, using graphs, tables, diagrams and ICT software;
- explain their work orally and/or through writing and draw conclusions;
- interpret a wide range of tables, lists, graphs and diagrams; create and interpret frequency tables, including those for grouped data;
- design and use a data collection sheet;
- interpret the results;
- enter information in a database or spreadsheet and interrogate and interpret the results;
- understand, calculate and use the mean and range of a set of discrete data.
Introduction to Probability
Pupils should be enabled to:
- become familiar with and use the language of probability;
- understand possible outcomes of simple random events;
- understand that there is a degree of uncertainty about the outcome of some events, while others are certain or impossible;
- place events in order of ‘likelihood’;
- understand and use the idea of ‘evens’ and know whether events are more or less likely than this.
