Key Stage 1 Curriculum
Our curriculum and mission statement centre around meeting the needs of each individual child and ensuring that we support them to be the best that they can be. Our learning values are strongly embedded throughout the school and children are given daily opportunities to develop and apply these values to their learning.
Whilst core learning is structured around the requirements of the National Curriculum, our wider school curriculum has been designed to meet the needs of the children in our community. We have a wide range of enhanced provisions that run alongside our curriculum for specific groups of children. Some of these include - Forest School, Sport. The Tree House and Nurture. So while you will find aspects that are common across many schools, you will also notice elements that make the Crofton Anne Dale curriculum uniquely ours.
At the Crofton Anne Dale Federation, we aim to deliver a curriculum that is broad, rich and balanced. We want to ensure that all children have access to a curriculum that allows them to develop skills and knowledge across the whole range of National Curriculum subjects. We aim to make learning exciting and fun by making meaningful connections across subject areas and setting the learning in engaging contexts. Our main goal is to secure good outcomes for all, and we carefully plan and adapt learning in order to meet the needs of each and every pupil. Our curriculum is underpinned by our core learning values of Creativity, Independence, Curiosity, Teamwork and Resilience, which we believe will support the children to become lifelong learners.
We take a thematic approach to planning and delivering the curriculum.
- Each unit of work is introduced through an introductory event or ‘hook’ to spark the children’s interest and introduce the key question for the unit.
- The children will keep revisiting the key question throughout the unit, with the aim being to give a full and reasoned response by the end of the sequence of learning through an ‘end product’. This may be a piece of writing, a drama performance, a 3D model, a video, a music performance.
- This way of approaching the curriculum ignites the children’s imagination, encourages them to ask questions whilst enabling them to make links within and across subjects and across year groups to build on prior learning.
- The children are able to learn and develop skills in one subject and apply them in another ensuring their learning is both meaningful and embedded. We also make the most of our grounds and outdoor learning facilities to enhance the learning experience of each unit, whilst promoting positive mental health and wellbeing. The children look after the welfare of all the school animals (chickens, guinea pigs, dogs, tortoise and baby ducks) as part of their learning.
- Children are guided to begin to have more freedom of choice and flexibility in terms of how they present the knowledge and skills they have acquired. They can begin to exercise their creativity and share their learning in a way that makes sense for them. This approach helps to prepare the children for Key Stage 2, where they frequently make their own choices about how to present their learning.
- The impact of delivering the curriculum in this way is that we have seen higher levels of engagement in the classroom; real excitement when a new question is unveiled; increased curiosity and problem-solving and a tangible improvement in learning outcomes.
If you have any questions about our curriculum, please speak to any member of staff who will be happy to discuss it with you.
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