Curriculum

At Davies lane, our inclusive curriculum supports the high expectations we have for all our children and enables our children to strive for academic excellence while developing a real love and enthusiasm for learning. It celebrates the social and cultural diversity of the school community while reinforcing the importance of British values.

 

The wide range of rich, exciting creative and sporting activities enables our children to have a range of choices while developing their all-round abilities and personal confidence. It supports them in developing their independence and deepens learning, thus enabling our children to be leaders of tomorrow.

 

 

                                                Arbor Academy Curriculum Statement

 

Learning is more effective when it is an active process rather than a passive process

- Kurt Lewin -

 

Rationale

Our curriculum will ensure that our children are keeping up, not catching up. At the Arbor Trust we want to ensure that our curriculum is broad, deep and knowledge based. Our curriculum will ensure our children develop critical thinking, problem solving and reasoning skills applied through a range of contexts.

 

At the end of a key stage or midpoint a key stage (Y2, Y4, Y6) pupils  develop a deeper understanding of key concepts by evaluating their knowledge and understanding from a range of subjects and topics. This can be presented in a number of different forms eg. debate, assembly presentation, role play, posters or pamphlets, book making and powerpoint presentations.

 

For us, a broad and deep curriculum:

 

•       Allows critical thinking

•       Develops vocabulary and concepts

•       Promotes inquiry, questioning, problem solving and reasoning

•       Is inclusive

•       Reflects all the pupils and the community it serves

•       Balances fun, aspirations and skills with inspirational outcomes across all key stages

•       It presents opportunities to widen horizons and expand the mind

•       Adds value to the community of pupils and parents it serves by developing skills and promoting future employment of local pupils

•       Deepens understanding using key concepts across a key stage

 

Our curriculum is underpinned by clear aims, content, pedagogy, assessment and evaluation. We want to prepare children for a diverse, competitive and ever-changing world. We aim to do this by ensuring that our pupils are exposed to innovative teaching through risk taking and problem solving in all subject areas, including:

 

·         Philosophy

·         Engineering and Construction

·         Agriculture

·         Technology

·         Architecture and Design

 

 

 

It is delivered through the main subjects:

 

·         History

·         Geography

·         Art

·         Design & Technology

·         Music

·         Religious Education

 

It is applied through the core subjects:

 

•       Reading

•       Writing

•       Speaking and listening

•       Mathematics

•       STEM

 

We aim to grow excellence through our curriculum. Our curriculum ensures the cumulative effect of layers of knowledge. We want to avoid the risk of narrowing the depth of understanding and focus on the building blocks of knowledge acquisition. Our effective curriculum that drives progress by ensuring mastery of skills and depth of learning. We are determined to see our children keep up, not continue to catch up.

 

What is the Arbor curriculum intention and rationale?

 

A good curriculum ensures progression of knowledge and skills. Our curriculum ensures life skills that can be applied in a range of contexts. Our curriculum should enable skills like:

 

•       Critical thinking

•       Oracy

•       Reading

•       Grammar, Spelling and Punctuation

•       Editing

•       Handwriting

•       STEM (science, engineering, construction)

•       Observational skills (Science in action)

•       Mathematical

•       Debating

•       Design

•       Research skills

•       Essay writing

 

Curriculum- Assessment and pedagogy

 

•       An effective curriculum aligns with assessment arrangements

•       It ensures pupils understand cause and effect through deepening understanding of key concepts

•       It ensures swift acquisition of knowledge and skills

•       Opportunities to apply the knowledge and skills in context

•       Our curriculum must enable development of vocabulary, key concepts, oracy, spelling, grammar and language skills

•       It ensures growing excellence is cultural

 

Skills specific progress

 

A progressive curriculum ensures pupils are learning new skills regularly and have a clear progressive path. It ensures that pupils deepen conceptual understanding and build on prior knowledge. To move from working towards expected standards to working at greater depth, there must be measureable progress in areas like:

 

•       Vocabulary progression

•       Oracy progression

•       Spelling progression

•       Punctuation progression

•       Mathematical progression

•       Scientific progression

 

Hidden layers of knowledge

 

Through our curriculum, we want pupils to gain hidden layers of knowledge that can be applied with confidence in a range of contexts. We want our curriculum to provide our pupils with the resilience to tackle problems without giving up. Our curriculum ensures our pupils show the characteristics of effective learning and thirst for knowledge. Our curriculum is focussed on developing core skills with opportunities to apply these skills through a knowledge based curriculum.

 

Arbor Curriculum Sequence

1.         PLANNING

·         Know your subject

·         Know your pupils (ASSESSMENT)

·         Plan at end of year expectations (CHALLENGE)

·         Resource lessons for 18:12 class layout (ACTIVE LEARNING)

 

1.1     Arbor Planning Guidance

Before you start to plan, think, what is the purpose of my planning? Improving pupil outcomes means a well thought through:

·         Sequence of curriculum (rationale, theme, link)

·         Sequence of teaching (teach, practice apply)

·         Sequence of outcomes (oral, written, response/feedback)

·         Sequence of feedback (what will improve the pupil outcome the most?)

 

Plan your questions ahead of the lesson for those working at emerging, expected and greater depth.

Does your plan for the week include the English and Maths skills you would like them to practice and apply across the curriculum?

Is the Maths a discrete standalone or linked to the main subjects, for example data interpretation of population in Geography?

Does your Art/ DT plan promote visual literacy, appraisal of artwork or still life?

In science, what are you:

·         Making

·         Creating

·         Innovating

·         Building

·         Constructing

·         Growing

·         Observing

 

Is the plan age appropriate for the children, at age expected? Will it move them from expected towards greater depth? Does it promote STEM, oracy, and tenses/ language development?

 

2.         TEACHING SEQUENCE

TEACH

·         Secure your subject knowledge- know what you are about to teach and how children learn it best;

·         Understand the standard/ Age related expectation;

·         Ask probing questions that elicit understanding and cause thinking- children only learn when questions cause them to think;

·         Model what you are asking the children to do at an age expected standard

·         Test knowledge through turn – taking (my turn, your turn)

PRACTISE

·         Support children in having a go at practicing new skills and knowledge;

·         The percentage of children practising with tasks at an age expected standard or above should show that you are moving towards  the 96% and 52% end of year target;

·         Practise needs to move children towards the expected standard/ age related expectation at the very least form their starting point.

APPLY

·         Apply the new skills and knowledge to different contexts;

·         Think about why the learning works in this  way and what would happen if the learning was applied in a different way or context;

·         Support children in reasoning about their new learning;

·         Develop the children’s ability to explain the learning using appropriate subject specific vocabulary.

 

3.         THE ROLE OF DIFFERENTIATION

 

We differentiate through use of a balance of this sequence of teaching and meeting the needs of a wide range of children through the use of 18:12 and planned individual resourcing.

 

4.              FEEDBACK

 

·         Ensure that age appropriate spellings are correct

·         Ensure the work is grammatically sound and written in standard English

·         Ensure that the question or comments made will enable progress and will move the child  towards the expected standard/ child related expectation

 

 

Please click on the links below to visit the britannica websites