Oral and mental activity

In most lessons, the oral and mental 'starter' activities continue to be rehearsal activities. Rehearsal and practice are designed to strengthen knowledge and skills. It is important that children have sufficient opportunity to consolidate the mathematics teaching they have received. Ofsted has pointed out that children's confidence is undermined by insufficient time to consolidate learning. This is a function that oral and mental activity can successfully fulfil, but oral and mental work fulfils many other purposes.

In the 1999 Framework there is a paragraph in the section on direct teaching (page 11) that sets out the hallmark of high-quality teaching.

'High-quality direct teaching is oral, interactive and lively. It is not achieved by adopting a simplistic formula of "drill and practice" and lecturing the class, or by expecting pupils to teach themselves from books. It is a two-way process in which pupils are expected to play an active part by answering questions, contributing points to discussions, and explaining and demonstrating their methods to the class.'

The importance of interactive oral and mental work in the mathematics lesson is clearly stated. It is to help children to use the language of mathematics and to practise and secure their recall, thinking and reasoning skills. Children need opportunities to listen to and use mathematical language and to explain their methods, ideas and reasoning and this should be planned for during the main part of the lesson. The 'starter' remains a key point in the lesson where whole-class oral and mental work takes place and children are expected to listen, speak and think about mathematics before they move on to the main teaching activity. However, it must not be the sole opportunity for children to be active learners, speaking and listening about mathematics and thereby clarifying and refining their understanding, thinking and ideas.