a Positive Contribution and Achieving Economic Well-being’ are the goal for every
child. In these centres nursery education is provided and in many centres research is
promoted. The Cambridge Learning Network is a unique two year research project
in that it is the only group of Children’s Centres to be given a Learning Network
research grant for mathematics (DfES, 2004d). There are six centres involved in this
network in the Cambridge area. The brief of the project is to focus on children’s
mathematical mark-making and the main objective is to ‘raise the quality of the
teaching and learning within the area of children’s development that leads to
written calculations’.
At the time of writing the project has only been running for six months and the
full impact and research outcomes are not yet finalised. To lay the foundations of
this project the Centres looked at what mathematics was already happening within
the environment and how this could be enhanced.The environment
An outcome of the project in these early stages is that it has heightened awareness
of the mathematics already happening in the centres. The preliminary findings of
the EEL project (Pascal and Bertram, 1997) also found that practitioners sometimes
were not aware of the mathematics within settings. Knowing about the
mathematics that is already evident in the setting is essential in order to be able to
develop provision. If practitioners are not aware of the mathematics then they are
not aware of the opportunities to support and develop children’s mathematical
learning. To extend these mathematical experiences the Cambridge project looked
at the environment and how to further develop opportunities. ‘What else can we
do?’ was a key question.
These are some ideas they tried:- numbers on trikes and bikes with numbers on corresponding parking bays
- adding different cardboard cylinders to the sand pit resources
- number lines more prominent and visible on tables and outside
- children’s pictures with the date of their birthday on display on the setting walls
- numbers on toilet doors
- clocks at children’s heights and in the play areas
- cards with pictures of different flavoured ice cream and their prices in the sand
with an ice cream scoop - shaped paper in the painting area
- selecting mathematical software games for the interactive whiteboard
- a mathematical box with different mathematical equipment in it for children to
use – ‘a mathematical tool kit’ - 3D opportunities inside and outside, for example tunnels and cardboard boxes for
children to play with.
The practitioners wanted to give more opportunities generally for mark-making
within the environment. and to support mathematical mark-making they added:170 Children’s Mathematics8657part 2.qxd 04/07/2006 17:28 Page 170