Quality of Education

Curriculum

Intent

Our school vision of Learn, Achieve, Love, Believe, is intrinsic throughout our curriculum. Staff set high expectations to ensure pupils achieve in all subjects, develop lifelong skills, and build a love of learning.

Our curriculum has been carefully developed and designed to ensure that pupils receive a quality curriculum in all subjects throughout the school. We ensure that learning is relevant and builds on what pupils have been taught previously, maximising opportunities for pupils to apply knowledge and skills in different contexts.

Our curriculum is bespoke and written to meet the needs and starting points of our children; it is planned to be ambitious for all pupils, whatever their starting point, and is designed so that learning is carefully sequenced in each year group and across the school, with clearly defined end points planned in all areas ensuring that children develop their knowledge and skills, building on what has been taught before. Key substantive and disciplinary concepts have been identified and mapped throughout the curriculum, ensuring that knowledge is not only revisited, but built upon, and that pupils have a deep understanding which allows them to independently apply knowledge fluently. The curriculum also prioritises the Personal, Learning and Thinking Skills (PLTS) which we believe pupils need to make them lifelong and effective learners –independent enquiry, creative thinking, reflective learners, team work, self-management and effective participation and communication.

Careful consideration and planning has taken place regarding the sequencing of the curriculum, taking into account the requirements of the NC and pupils’ prior learning and how knowledge builds on prior learning. An example of this is how the history curriculum is sequenced so that the topics run in reverse chronological order, starting with the most recent history content in early years leading to the study of the Stone Age in Y6. This organisational decision ensures that pupils have the deepest understanding about history, accessing learning about the furthest periods of time as their developmental understanding of chronology increases, building on their knowledge of key events in history in sequence. This structure will allow them to access the learning successfully and at the deepest level, making links to prior learning as they go.

Leaders and subject leaders have ensured that sequencing of individual subjects was supported by other subjects, and where appropriate, cross curricular links are made to exploit opportunities for pupils to apply learning and concepts across different topics eg Y6 looking at their Science topic of evolution in line with the Stone Age topic. This took careful consideration to ensure that the links were beneficial and added depth to learning, rather than being simply tokenistic. Due to this extensive planning of the curriculum, leaders were able to decide on clearly articulated outcomes for each year group, as well as mapping the skills and knowledge that will be systematically taught throughout the school through the Key Concepts identified for each subject. The attainment and progress from starting points for all pupils, especially those from vulnerable groups, is priority for all staff. The use of immediate intervention and carefully planned scaffolding within lessons, as well as pre-teach opportunities, enable a ‘keep up not catch up’ approach across the school.

The content of our curriculum is ambitious, with high expectations for subject specific knowledge and vocabulary development, as well as pupils being challenged to develop their social and moral understanding of key issues which they will face in modern Britain eg through the integration of sustainable living goals into our Science Week, or the implicit links to British Values in all areas of the curriculum. By planning for this to be integrated through the curriculum, it means that our pupils develop an understanding of these ideals and issues and what they mean to us in everyday ‘real life’ eg looking at the FBV of individual liberty through the teaching of the Titanic topic, or democracy when learning about Nelson Mandela. As we constantly strive for excellence in all areas, the work on our curriculum is always under review and regular monitoring and staff feedback allows for developments to be ongoing.

Reading

Leaders ensure that reading is prioritised across the school. A significant emphasis is placed on quality teaching of reading, and leaders have ensured high quality CPD for all staff in this area. This has been provided through in-house training from the HT who is an English SLE, and the highly-skilled subject lead, as well as through high-quality training from our Trust CPD provider ‘North West Learning Partnership’. Development in reading is sequenced through the school, starting with the use of Read, Write Inc in Reception to deliver a synthetic phonics programme, through to the teaching of comprehension skills.

Staff are trained by RWInc trainers in the programme to ensure pace and fluency as pupils begin their reading journey. Each year the school engages in development days during which the RWInc trainer attends school to celebrate success and to highlight any areas for development. In order to further support the teaching and pupils’ acquisition of phonics, we ensure that home books are explicitly matched to their phonics stage. To develop pupils’ love and interest in reading, they also take home a sharing book which is chosen from a wide selection of high-quality and language rich texts, which build pupils’ understanding of elements such as character, plot and settings. Parents have a clear understanding from Family Learning sessions at the start of each year that these books are designed to be shared, and may contain phonemes that the pupils haven’t encountered, but that is okay as parents can read the words. Parents have been informed that these books may also contain common exception words that the pupils should be able to access and should be encouraged to read. Parents are aware of these words as they are in the pupil’s reading records and this is also discussed with parents regularly through workshops and family sessions.

As children finish the RWInc programme, they access a rich diet of guided reading through whole class and group sessions. This focuses on developing pupils’ reading fluency and deepening their understanding of texts. We continue to promote pupils’ love of reading by ensuring plenty of opportunities for reading for pleasure. Class libraries are stocked with newly-released books funded through school fund raising activities. Focus days such as National Poetry day, National Storytelling Day and World Book Day, plus extra-curricular activities such as reading club, further engage our pupils in reading for pleasure. Alongside home reading books, pupils continue to take home books from class lending libraries to enjoy with their families. We also have in school initiatives such as Mystery Readers and story box sessions to encourage families to engage in reading with their children.

Culture Capital

The curriculum is carefully constructed to ensure culture capital for all our pupils. This is done through specific subjects but also through whole school initiatives that are embedded across the curriculum. These include our UNICEF work as a Rights Respecting School, our work on global goals and our commitment to going beyond the national curriculum to enhance learning opportunities. The latter includes things such as providing a financial education for our pupils and a comprehensive extra-curricular offer including learning experiences beyond the school gates to develop pupils not only academically, but the whole child. Although not statutory, our curriculum includes specifically taught PSHE lessons. We consider that this is an integral element, to ensure a well-rounded approach to pupils’ personal development, and particularly given the increasing vulnerability of many of our students and families, as well as ensuring that essential Safeguarding elements are woven throughout the curriculum from an early age.

Teaching of Safeguarding Curriculum Map

Implementation

There is a wide range of subject expertise throughout the staff, including the HT being a Specialist Leader in Education, the SENDCo undertaking the NASENCo accreditation and the Maths lead being an accredited Maths Master. Where staff are less experienced, they are supported by curriculum subject leaders. A high quality and comprehensive CPD has been planned into the school budget to develop teachers’ understanding of subject specific pedagogy, in core and foundation subjects. Collaboration with leaders from the Trust schools has also enabled staff to benefit from the expertise of subject specialists to develop practice eg in year groups where the Ark Maths Mastery programme is used, staff take part in Development Days with the curriculum leader and external PD lead to develop practice and ensure high quality learning opportunities. We ensure that any curriculum developments and CPD approaches are steeped in research to inform our practice. The EEF Teaching and Learning Toolkit, for example, has been used to inform pupil support plans and interventions in school and more recently the EEF guide to implementation and recent research on cognitive overload is helping to support our ongoing development of the curriculum. This approach ensures depth and breadth in learning by making meaningful connections and effective use of the CPA approach.

In English, we use a book-led approach which ensures that pupils are given meaningful reading and writing opportunities within a context. A language specialist is employed to deliver Spanish to pupils from Y2-Y6. Music is taught using Charanga as a resource and is supplemented in KS2 by specialist brass tuition from the music service. A qualified sports coach works alongside staff to deliver PE.

Regardless of the subject taught, we use similar approaches to ensure that pupils apply their learning and embed key concepts into long term memory. The application of learning is critical to this approach. Staff are able to ensure this is effective through having a thorough knowledge of pupils’ prior learning, to make essential links for pupils e.g. all pupils have timelines in their history books which are progressive and have details of prior topics studied. This allows teachers to make links to areas of learning of gone before. Topics are planned with clear end points, and aim to engage children on an emotional level with an issue or problem, that requires them to build knowledge to achieve an outcome or solution, therefore giving learning a real-life context. Our aim is investment rather than simply engagement.

Skilled questioning and strategies such as live marking ensure that teachers have a clear picture of pupils learning within a lesson. Teachers then use this information to tailor lessons to meet pupils’ needs and to ensure that the end points planned into the sequence of learning are reached by all pupils. Teachers build on pupils’ prior learning using strategies such as retrieval practise and opportunities for discussion and application. Staff use their excellent subject knowledge effectively to make links within and across subjects and this is evidenced in the depth of pupils’ understanding of concepts and ability to apply thinking throughout the curriculum.

Teaching of reading is done through discrete lessons as well as being applied through various subjects. Early reading consists of phonics teaching, as well as teachers focussing on developing pupils’ understanding of plot, character and story language through exploration of key texts. As pupils move through the school, this is developed and the skills of reading comprehension are developed, through use of high-quality fiction and non-fiction texts, which challenge pupils and expose them to high standards of language. Rapid identification of barriers where pupils are not working at ARE ensures that effective intervention is put in place, whether it be for decoding/word reading skills, or comprehension skills. Where pupils struggle with inferential understanding, staff have had CPD to support them in identifying the areas that are causing them to have difficulties and use this assessment to plan effectively to address them. This unwavering focus on developing reading skills, ensures that all pupils are able to access all areas of the curriculum.

Impact

The impact of our curriculum is evident in the rise in progress and attainment between 2017-2022, demonstrating that the school is rapidly improving, with all measures being above 0 for 2019, and placing the school in the top 10% for reading and maths. Leaders acknowledge that historic low attainment impacts on this. As standards are rising in KS1 we expect progress measures to reflect this.

KS2 data from 2022 was not as high, in both progress and attainment, however this is a cohort specific issue, not systemic across the school, with GLD, KS1 and phonics results still demonstrating strong practice across the school, despite the impact of the pandemic.

Pupils across the school make excellent progress from their relatively low starting points, and variation between key groups is not systemic and rather cohort related. A robust focus on the progress of higher attaining pupils has led to a rise in pupils achieving Greater Depth, particularly at the end of KS1, and leaders are confident that as current standards and high quality approaches to teaching continue, impact will be evident with more consistency in KS2 data as these classes move through the school.

KS2 attainment has improved between 2017-19, with progress measures being average or above average in all areas in 2018 and 2019 years, demonstrating that pupils are able to apply age appropriate mathematical knowledge, concepts and procedures, and demonstrate appropriate comprehension skills. In 2022, the decline in data was due to specific cohort issues, which had been identified and robust interventions put in place, however the impact of these were not as significant due to the impact of the pandemic on this class of pupils.

Attainment on entry to EYFS has remained broadly similar over a number of years, however the % of pupils achieving GLD has risen steadily: 2017 – 63%, 2018 – 73%, 2019 – 80%, 2020 – 83%, 2021 –76% (TA), 2022 –83%.

Attainment in KS1 is broadly in line with national, despite the attainment on entry being significantly below expected. This is evidence of the impact of the quality of teaching and learning and the ambitious curriculum in place, which enables pupils to make rapid progress from their starting points, bringing them in line with national attainment by the end of KS1, and enabling them to exceed by the end of KS2. Due to the impact of the national pandemic, there was no nationally reported data in 2020 and 2021 for KS1. In 2022, KS1 demonstrated the impact of the disruption to education, with attainment being lower than previous years, however rigorous analysis of pupils’ development areas by leaders has ensured a clear plan is in place to ensure that this continues to be addressed and that attainment data continues to rapidly improve.

Phonics data has shown an increase from 33% previously, and leaders continue to rigorously monitor and review the teaching of phonics to ensure that attainment will be consistently over 95%.

In the Phonics screening check (PSC), which was completed in December 2020, 79% of Y2 pupils achieved the expected standard, with 4/5 children who did not achieve it in the December achieving it when tested again in June 2021.Y1 PSC results for 2021 were 71%, and in 2022 this rose to 100%, with 97% of Y2 pupils achieving the PSC standard by the end of Y2.

Leaders are relentless in their determination to ensure that pupils achieve well in all areas, reversing the impact of the pandemic and ensuring accelerated progress where necessary, and in-house and externally planned CPD and support ensures that staff are equipped with the excellent subject knowledge and pedagogy to be able to do this.

Internal data shows that SEND pupils make sustained progress from their starting points. Where standard assessments are not appropriate, assessment measures to track ‘soft data’ and small steps of progress are used to give an accurate picture of the progress of SEND pupils.

School leaders, alongside curriculum leaders, analyse data for all subjects. This allows them to identify trends and where there is variation. Moderation of all subjects both internally and externally allows leaders to assure that pupils are acquiring the expected knowledge and skills as planned into the curriculum. Regular monitoring of reading demonstrates that pupils are reading widely and fluently, which is enabling them to access learning across the curriculum. Pupils not achieving the PSC standard quickly catch up, and this ongoing progress in monitored by leaders throughout KS2.