Numeracy at RMPS
BIG IDEAS IN NUMBER:
Our school teaches Numeracy with the Big Ideas by Professor Di Siemon. The Big Ideas are about creating "number sense" - a person’s general understanding of number and operations along with the ability and inclination to use this understanding in flexible ways to make mathematical judgements and to develop useful and efficient strategies for managing numerical situations. The Big Ideas are the sequential building blocks to "number sense".
The Big Ideas in Number is a framework that supports the conceptual development of number sense, which is fundamental to mathematical learning. If students don’t have a solid understanding of these big ideas, their progress in the number strand and mathematics in general will be more difficult.
BIG IDEAS IN NUMBER LEARNING PROGESSION
- Trusting the Count: developing flexible mental objects for the numbers 0 to 10.
- Place-value: the importance of moving beyond counting by ones, the structure of the base 10 numeration system.
- Multiplicative thinking: the key to understanding rational number and developing efficient mental and written computation strategies in later years.
- Partitioning: the missing link in building common fraction and decimal knowledge and confidence.
- Proportional reasoning: extending what is known about multiplication and division beyond rule-based procedures to solve problems involving fractions, decimals, percent, ratio, rate and proportion.
- Generalising: skills and strategies to support equivalence, recognition of number properties and patterns, and the use of algebraic text without which it is impossible to engage with broader curricula expectations at this level.
