Parish Church of England Primary School

Curriculum

The curriculum we offer our pupils is varied, rich and relevant. It promotes the spiritual, moral, cultural, mental and physical development of pupils at the school and prepares them for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of later life. The curriculum consists of all the planned activities which promote learning and development. It includes not only the formal requirements of the National Curriculum, but also the range of extra-curricular activities that the school organises in order to enrich the experiences of the children.

For further information about our curriculum, please contact Mrs Pickard, via the school office, who is our curriculum manager.

Intent

Our strategy to develop our curriculum is rooted in our striving to be a centre of excellence, where teaching is of the highest quality, where subjects are given equal importance ensuring breadth and balance, where learning is relevant, inclusive and inspires our pupils and where the community work together to achieve this common aim. 

The curriculum is designed to:

  • Inspire our learners by creating opportunities to acquire, develop and apply a range of knowledge, skills and understanding through a broad, exciting, challenging and relevant curriculum.
  • Recognise the needs and aspirations of all individuals so they are able to develop their God-given talents and lead happy and fulfilling lives.
  • Develop individuals with enquiring and curious minds, good thinking skills, self-respect, self-discipline and positive attitudes.
  • Develop enduring values of integrity, trust, generosity, honesty, respect and care.
  • Encourage children to value the diversity in our society and to care and protect the environment they live in; encourage them to become active and responsible citizens, contributing positively to their local community and society has a whole.

Our curriculum is distinctive in that it is tailored to the needs of our children and is designed to meet the changing demographics of our local area.  

  • All subjects are giving equal importance.  This doesn’t mean that all subjects are taught for the same amount of time but it does mean that a subject will be not be sacrificed for the sake of another.
  • Cross-curricular approach, enriched with high quality texts which has been designed by the staff allowing ownership of the curriculum.  
  • Topics take into account prior experience and knowledge and have been chosen to ensure diversity and to meet the socio economic backgrounds of our pupils.
  • Planned starting points for each topic, delivered by inspirational teachers, which hook, motivate and enthuse the children to want to know more.
  • Importance of outdoor learning with Forest School provision for all year groups which “offers ALL learners regular opportunities to achieve and develop confidence and self-esteem through hands-on learning experiences in a woodland or natural environment with trees.”
  • Non-negotiable expectation that we strive for all children to achieve expected national curriculum standards.
  • Specialist teachers are employed for Spanish, P.E., Computing and Music.
  • Challenge curriculum to develop critical thinking, including partnership with Trinity School STEM projects.
  • Enrichment Curriculum which includes activities that we would want all children to have had the opportunity to do before they leave Parish e.g. visit a theatre, see the sea, learn a poem off by heart. 
  • Extra curricular provision programme including opportunities for participating in sport and music events.
  • LSS are deployed to meet the needs of the children and support differentiated teaching activities and deliver personalised intervention programmes.  Skills audits allow their strengths to be utilised.

Implementation

EYFS 

EYFS follow a child initiated topic based curriculum with each of the three classrooms focussing on a particular area (English, Maths or Creative).  Children are able to free flow between the classes and the outdoor area in order to access a range of purposeful and developmental activities.

KS1 and KS2

Our curriculum for KS1 and KS2 is organised into key areas (essentials, humanities, creative and active, critical thinking and life skills) each with equal importance.  All phases are interlinked and where possible subjects are woven together linking to a key geography or history topic each term.  Key texts, of high quality, are used to enrich the topics.  

A whole school overview document identifies how topics build on prior knowledge and understanding.  This document also feeds into medium term plans, which include sections on key skills, key vocabulary, knowledge organisers, key questions and weekly differentiated activities.  These plans ensure progression, revisiting of skills and knowledge and hold staff to account on expectations.  

Running through out the year is our Enrichment Programme, Challenge Curriculum and Nurture Group, which support children at all stages.

Impact

By taking this approach to our curriculum, our pupils will develop detailed knowledge, and skills across a wide range of subjects and topics.  We aim to continue to improve our progress measures and the percentage of pupils who achieve age related expectations.

Our curriculum also prepares our pupils to be life long learners, ready for each new step on their learning journey.  They will be pupils who develop a love of learn who have a wide range of interests, high aspirations for the future and a determination to make their hopes and dreams come true.

 

Curriculum-Gallery (ID 1002)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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