St Dunstan's SchoolCurriculum
Curriculum Vision
Introduction
Our curriculum underpins our values, vision and ethos:
'We journey with Jesus beside us'
We believe deeply in the importance of helping our pupils develop as a whole person - happy and ready to take the next steps into their education and lives beyond primary school, regardless of their starting point. We celebrate our differences.
Our pupil’s background, culture and our climate for learning are all underpinned by Christ at the centre in our curriculum. By Christ at the centre we aim to provide:
- A curriculum which is enriched by a full Religious curriculum which permeates throughout
- A broad and rich curriculum where our children can explore their thoughts, ideas and feelings
- A curriculum which provides the breadth and depth for our children to grow and develop as a whole child
- A curriculum which is enhanced by other experiences to widen our children’s knowledge
We work hard to ensure our children are “school ready”, “work ready” and “life ready” and have designed a curriculum which captures the children`s imagination, stimulates natural curiosity and creates a love for learning that is lifelong.
Our Aims
To provide a broad and balanced education for all children that is carefully planned and sequenced to support the acquisition of knowledge and key skills through the foundations set in EYFS that are continued and built upon in KS1 and KS2.
To provide learning that is meaningful so that children are able to use what they have learnt, and apply it in new situations.
To ensure that our children have high aspirations in all that they do
To equip pupils with the knowledge and cultural capital they need to succeed in life.
To support the physical development of all children by encouraging them to stay active and take responsibility for their own health.
To ensure equal access to learning for all pupils, with high expectations for every pupil and appropriate levels of challenge and support to meet their individual needs.
Our Curriculum Intent
At St Dunstan’s, we deliver a broad, rich and varied curriculum which is underpinned by our mission statement, “We journey with Jesus beside us”. Religious Education forms the backbone to our curriculum as we strive to enable learners to achieve their best and be citizens who are kind, respectful and confident.
Our curriculum is derived from a precise understanding of the context of which we serve. Our curriculum is designed to engage and enthuse learners, providing children with the ability to become independent, confident, reflective, creative and resilient learners, who aim high.
Over their time at St Dunstan’s, children will build on their knowledge, regularly reflecting and building upon previous work, while also making links through wider themes or ‘Big Ideas’. Learning is specifically sequenced to ensure there is clear progression from year to year
Our curriculum is planned and sequenced to develop deep, long-lasting learning, building upon prior knowledge, which our children can use today, tomorrow and for the rest of their lives. By developing links across their studies, children learn more, remember more and do more.
We aim to equip our children with the knowledge and cultural capital they need to succeed in life and in effect, provide them with social mobility. Our understanding of “knowledge and cultural capital” is that it is the essential knowledge that pupils need to be educated citizens, introducing them to the best that has been thought and said and helping to engender an appreciation of human creativity and achievement. We promote children to have high aspiration for themselves and their learning, ensuring they can excel despite any socio-economic constraints.
Our curriculum reflects the school`s local context. It may be that children in our local area may not be exposed to a wide vocabulary or have a rich exposure to quality reading materials. This can lead to difficulties when comprehending and inferring from texts and when writing with understanding and creativity. It is therefore crucial that children are taught explicit and key vocabulary across the curriculum. Words have the power to ignite imaginations and unlock doors to a world of understanding, in all subjects.
It may be that children are unable to be taken on holidays, trips or to clubs that will expose them to finding out about local, national or international environments, art, history, science, sport, technology or music. We therefore introduce our children to a range of visitors and experiences in school and take them on trips which enrich their subject knowledge and curiosity about the world around them.
Visits, visitors and ‘hooks’ for learning provide a variety of first-hand experiences for our children, to spark their interest, relate new learning to their own experience and to reflect upon and respond to the things that they see and hear and touch.
Our curriculum outlines the knowledge and skills that children need to enable them to take advantage of opportunities, responsibilities and experiences in later life. There is a difference between knowledge which is retained close to the point of teaching and that which will be retained forever. Our curriculum contains essential knowledge that children will need in order to access the next year`s objectives e.g. the end points in each subject area that children will need to know and be able to do, in a logical progression.
