St Giles on the Heath Primary School

Curriculum Design and Intent

We have designed our curriculum at St Giles on the Heath to closely tie in with our school vision ‘creating life – long learners by bringing education alive’.

 

Through our curriculum we want our children to be inspired, to believe in themselves and to achieve their very best.

 

At St Giles on the Heath we want ALL our children to develop a life - long love of learning and to be curious, motivated and excited about coming to school.  In order for that to happen, our curriculum is taught in a fun, dynamic and interesting way for the children to be able to gain significant knowledge across a broad range of subjects.

 

Our curriculum not only includes the formal requirements of the National Curriculum (2014), but also any other activity organised by the school, for example, extra – curricular activities and any other activities designed to enrich the experience of the children.

 

At the core of our school vision we want our children to be prepared for the future, therefore our curriculum teaches and trains the children to have planning, learning and thinking skills where the children through the work that they do will be able to learn to be a self – manager, a reflector, a team player, a problem solver, an effective participator, a creative thinker and an independent enquirer.  These are all-important skills that will enable children not only to be secondary school ready but to become life – long learners.

 

We follow a thematic curriculum on a two year rolling programme where commonality exists between subjects and aspects of learning is linked and lessons taught using a cross curricular approach.  This helps to develop skills, knowledge and a real life understanding over a longer period of time.  Where this is not achievable subjects are taught discretely.  The curriculum is coherently planned and carefully sequenced.

 

At St Giles on the Heath we believe strongly that the curriculum MUST NOT be narrowed.

 

All subjects have value and importance and children should experience all of them at Primary School.  In order to gain the best knowledge and understanding of all subjects, excellent literacy and numeracy skills are essential.  Therefore, as a school we place great importance on reading, writing and maths. 

We want all of our children to be fluent and confident readers making great progress from their starting points by the time they leave primary school.

 

What we want our curriculum to do for our children at St Giles on the Heath Primary School

 

• To provide a broad and balanced curriculum where all children have access to a full range of subjects.

 

• To provide children with a context with rich learning opportunities to excite and inspire.

 

• To provide children with the ability and opportunity to make links with prior learning, therefore gaining depth and ownership of knowledge which can be transferable to other areas of learning.

 

• The curriculum is cross curricular wherever possible in order to develop the child’s knowledge, skills and understanding while motivating them to learn through stimulating, interconnected topics.

 

• The curriculum allows children to be active participants in their learning and we want our children to talk about their learning: to know where they are, where they need to go next and how they are going to get there.

 

• Our Physical Education, PSHE curriculums and our after school clubs provide plentiful opportunities for our children to be fit and healthy both mentally and physically. 

 

• Children will have access to various subjects taught by specialist teachers e.g. Music, French and Physical Education.

 

• The music curriculum will provide all children with the opportunity to play an instrument in music lessons during their time at primary school.

 

• The creative arts curriculum provides children with the opportunities to express themselves through the mediums of art, music, dance and drama.

 

• Aspects of our curriculum will model and teach children the school’s core values: Respect, Kindness, Resilience, Honesty, Trust and Co-operation.

 

• Our curriculum values all learning styles.

 

• Within our curriculum, the children will have the opportunities to investigate, think and develop their enquiry skills.

• Our curriculum teaches the art of communication and it is expected that children talk and explain in full sentences about their learning with each other.

 

• Children will have opportunities to take part in collapsed curriculum days where the whole school community joins together to work on something topical such as the Olympics.

 

• To take advantage of our local area/outside environment to allow for more creative learning opportunities.

                                               

 

Through our curriculum, we want our children to adopt fundamental British Values and be responsible citizens with strong moral standards and able to contribute positively to society.