Our School Curriculum:
Intent
What is our intent? What are we trying to achieve with our curriculum?
At High Ercall Primary School, we believe that our curriculum is designed to inspire, engage and challenge our pupils. At its core is the transferrable knowledge and skills the children learn in Mathematics and English, and the progressive development of knowledge in all subject areas.
Across the curriculum, across every year group, our key school drivers are to:
- develop life skills through our 5Rs - responsibility, resilience, resourcefulness, reflection, and respect;
- enable the children to engage in active learning and access our outdoor learning environment; and
- show an understanding of diversity – within our community and beyond. Our curriculum is built with consideration of these drivers at the centre, to enable our pupils to develop skills and understanding for later life.
Because of our mixed year groups, we have designed our curriculum to consider the journey of a child through the school - as children will spend 2 years in some classes. We have mapped out the knowledge and skills progressively to consider this carefully to ensure that learning is not repeated and that children cover all of the statutory requirements of the National Curriculum.
In addition, each curriculum area is sequenced carefully to build upon and revisit substantive knowledge (for example: WHAT are the key concepts in history) and the disciplinary knowledge (for example: HOW to think in a historical way). This is mapped out and considered carefully to create exciting curriculum content for each class, across a 2 year rolling programme of learning.
We have considered carefully the readiness of our children for secondary school - so that they leave High Ercall Primary school equipped with our 5Rs, and the knowledge, skills and attitudes to become successful and lifelong learners.
Implementation
How do we deliver our curriculum?
Our curriculum is delivered through exciting and engaging learning opportunities for our children both in school and out: lessons, assemblies, visits, visitors, workshops, residentials, extra-curricular activities, sport opportunities and fundraising. We deliver Mathematics, English, Science, PSHE and the National Curriculum Foundation subjects in line with expectations in the National Curriculum. Knowledge (substantive and disciplinary) and curricular skills are taught progressively through the year groups for all subjects and content is taught through a thematic approach where appropriate - so links may be made between art and history for example, and reading will link throughout.
As a school: we place high expectations on teaching and learning across the whole curriculum; we deliver effective teaching and learning, making relevant links across subjects; we plan, teach and revisit knowledge in all areas of the curriculum; we teach skills which will be transferrable across subjects; we promote resilience in learning and social contexts within our 5Rs; we plan a broad and balanced curriculum over a 2 year rolling programme for each class; we work in partnership with parents of all our pupils, and other agencies, to support positive learning and behaviour.
Reading, writing and mathematics follow a yearly planning cycle, using objectives from the National Curriculum, and planned progressively building upon prior knowledge. High quality reading material is also specifically chosen to support vocabulary and knowledge taught in other curriculum areas.
Our science curriculum is planned over a two year rolling programme, to take into account the two year groups we have in every class. Our science lead has planned a progressive curriculum which builds upon the knowledge of prior learning in science topics so that both substantive knowledge and disciplinary knowledge develop progressively.
Our National Curriculum foundation subjects (History, Geography, Art, DT, French, Music, Computing, PE) and RE are planned over a two year rolling programme for each class. Because we have two year groups in each class, this enables us to cover all the knowledge required in the National Curriculum. We have planned the progression of knowledge carefully, building the children's understanding key concepts in the different disciplines to map out the curriculum. Please see the different subject pages for more information.
Inclusion
Our children with any additional needs access the same high quality teaching and learning in all aspects as their peers. Our curriculum is fully inclusive. Children may also be supported through an Individual Provision Map or additional intervention support. Where necessary a differentiated curriculum is fully planned to take into account individual needs. This is monitored by the class teachers and our SENDCO - Sarah Roberts - and parents are fully engaged and involved.
Impact
What is the impact of our curriculum and how do we know?
The impact of our curriculum is that by the end of Year 6 our children achieve highly, they are secondary ready, they have our 5Rs as values for learning and life and they have enjoyed a broad and balanced curriculum both within the school day but also as the opportunities offered in our extended curriculum.
School leaders, including Governors, and teachers regularly measure the impact of our curriculum through the monitoring of teaching and learning, monitoring of behaviour, assessment and on-going self-review. We talk to children and parents; we undertake learning walks; we look at books and we review the curriculum as subject leaders.
We have an established system of Governor review – each Governor follows a line of enquiry to evaluate and monitor across all areas of school life. Each term a new development plan is written and shared with staff and leaders, outlining priorities within the curriculum and other aspects of school life, and making links to longer term school development planning which is in place.
We aim to ensure that our children are: emotionally and academically prepared for the next phase of their education; motivated to succeed and achieve and are equipped with the personal skills to do this.
Mrs Sarah Roberts, Headteacher is in charge of the curriculum management.
The curriculum rolling programme for each class can be seen below. Please click the link to find out more for each class.
