Curriculum Overview

At Chatburn CE Primary School, we consider the needs and background of our children. Our curriculum is planned so that pupils to grow as independent learners which helps pupils to build aspirations and know available possibilities for their future lives. We want our pupils to understand and appreciate their locality which facilitates their relationship to the wider world.

Learning challenges are carefully pitched to ensure children access work at age-related expectations, with regular and sustained challenge through higher level objectives. Basic skills are an integral part of this and are developed as a consequence. We ensure children work at their age related expectations and encourage and support children to exceed their own expectations through challenge.

To support engagement, 'Wow' events and theme days/weeks are planned to regularly challenge thinking and contextualise learning. In addition, it is the expectation that our pupils will regularly engage with the community or educational visits or visitors, to provide a broad and rich learning experience that develops Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural aspects of learners' education.

We believe that all children should experience the feeling of accomplishment in a wide range of areas.
Our curriculum gives pupils an excellent mix of academic and personal development; it gives equal importance to core and foundation subjects; physical wellbeing and mental wellbeing are both valued, understood and prioritised by our careful consideration of curriculum design.

Spiritual, moral, social and cultural development, along with a well-planned and structured programme of personal development underpins all of our work. We carefully balance the requirement for pupils to reach national expectations in core subjects with our wider curriculum aims of providing full spectrum of thoughtful and enriching experiences.
We value the progress and fulfilment of our pupils academically, but equally, we strive to offer them a rich and varied curriculum too. Alongside offering our children a carefully mapped progression of skills across all subjects, we give them the opportunity to express their learning in a variety of ways. As a result of this, our pupils thrive.

At our school, the children in our care are at the heart of everything we do. We believe that all children are unique and must be celebrated for the special gifts and talents that they possess. Each day we encourage our children to work hard, have a positive mind-set, have the confidence to make mistakes, persevere and not give up – in order to succeed, and to feel good about themselves.

INTENT

At Chatburn we want our children to experience:

A curriculum that has knowledge and vocabulary at the heart of their learning
A rich curriculum that enables pupils to see the world from a wide range of perspectives
A curriculum where knowledge underpins and enables the application of skills
Opportunities to embed skills and express knowledge in a variety of ways before moving on
Developing resilience, perseverance, challenge and support so they have the confidence to aim high and aspire to more
Opportunities to delve deeper into their learning, building on skills progressively each year
A curriculum that responds to findings from pupil feedback and school data to ensure it is suited to their needs and reflects the ever changing world, locally and globally
A curriculum that helps children to know how to live healthy lifestyles – both physically and mentally
Spiritual, moral, social and cultural experiences threaded through all we do which will facilitate them with all they need to face the any and all futures
A strong Christian ethos permeating through daily life which gives the children a safe and nurturing environment

We define progress as the widening and deepening of essential knowledge, skills, understanding and behaviours.

We underpin our curriculum with ‘The Chatburn Charter’ which we feel will enable our children to experience the wonders of God’s world and equip them for 21st Century life as respectful, kind citizens.

Teaching Intentions

Teachers ensure consistency and distinctiveness of our curriculum.
Teaching is based on a clear understanding of cognition and learning.
Teachers have deep knowledge of the subjects they teach.
Teachers monitor learning and provide feedback.
The classroom climate created by teachers inspires and motivates all pupils.
Pupil groupings are flexible and not solely driven by perceived “ability” or prior attainment.
Developing strong partnership with parents and carers that influence learning at school and home

IMPLEMENTATION

Chatburn School has adopted a connected, creative curriculum. Its foundations are the National Curriculum objectives, a transferable bank of core skills and real life experiences designed to make learning meaningful, exciting and relevant to our pupils.

National Curriculum objectives and Lancashire skills progression guidance (KLIPS) from across the foundation subjects have been organised into cross-curricular topics which provide a clear context for learning. Our Curriculum is a carefully planned, practical, thematic approach to teaching and learning designed to support children’s natural curiosity and stimulate their creativity. It offers children the opportunity to work in depth, giving them the time they need to reflect, consolidate, transfer and apply their learning. We feel that putting learning into a context makes it a more meaningful experience. Organising the learning in this way ensures teachers have the flexibility to deliver the curriculum in the way that they feel will have most impact for learners.

We see the local community as valuable to our children’s learning so we thread these links into the curriculum throughout each year group. Using the outdoors as a classroom, trips/activities and experts are all vital to the enhancement of the learning opportunities we offer our children.

The core skills we focus on through our curriculum include :

Emotional Skills: Manage my Feelings, Be Self Aware, Understand Others’ Feelings

Social Skills: Be independent, Collaborate, Value and Support Others, Communicate, Listen

Motivation: Set Goals, Persevere, Managing Distractions

Problem Solving: Plan, Make Choices, Reason

Apply Knowledge: Form Opinions, Apply Knowledge

Enquire: Be Curious, Question

Creativity: Lateral Thinking, Use Imagination

Evaluation: Reflect, Revise

Teachers choose BRAVE (bold, relevant, aspirational, varied and engaging) topic headings for half term or termly blocks, which are led by the content of the foundation subjects. This allows areas of learning to be joined together in an engaging and creative way. Learning is enhanced by real life experiences; trips, visitors, use of ICT and practical activities, which are built into every unit of work.

Teachers only make links that are appropriate and meaningful. On occasion, discreet teaching of subjects is required and in particular within Mathematics, R.E. and P.E.

Topics usually follow a 2 year cycle to accommodate our mixed age classes and may have a particular subject focus. Some topics incorporate several foundation subjects. The choice of topic may change according to the needs and interests of a particular cohort and may also reflect a particular interest, expertise or passion of a class teacher.

The skills progression documents for each subject which run across the school, demonstrate the progression of subject knowledge and skills throughout Key Stage 1 and Key Stage 2. Subject leaders robustly monitor their subject to ensure progression and coverage.

English
At Chatburn we place great emphasis on developing the skills of reading but also reading for pleasure.

We place a major focus on language, vocabulary and early reading, in terms of both phonics and developing a ‘love of reading’.

We take children through a writer’s journey in order to improve them as writers. Firstly, children are exposed to a particular genre where they learn about particular key features and techniques, being exposed to what a good one looks like as an example. Next, children are given a purposeful and exciting writing stimulus which promotes and encourages creativity. They explore and record their ideas through drafting, editing and proofreading, honing their skills through focussed teacher feedback. Finally, children present their completed work before being challenged to compose their own independent piece of writing based on their studied genre.

Handwriting, spelling, punctuation & grammar are taught, recapped and reinforced through their writing.

Maths
At our school, mathematical fluency and confidence in numeracy are regarded as preconditions of success across the whole curriculum.

We are passionate about the developments children make in mathematics. Children in all year groups are introduced to new concepts by exploring hands-on resources before moving to pictorial and abstract levels of questioning.

We aim for a balance between mathematical fluency (arithmetic), reasoning and problem solving in order to ensure that our children are able to apply the skills that they learn in the classroom to everyday life. Children are also given opportunities to apply their learning in mathematics during enterprise projects and STEM projects. By creating a rich and exciting mathematical curriculum, we aim to create budding mathematicians, who have deep understanding of number and a desire to tackle a range of problems in order for them to become life-long mathematicians.

The Early Years Foundation Stage

The Foundation stage curriculum is based on the six areas of learning working towards achieving the Early Learning goals by the end of the Foundation Stage. The goals are expectations of achievement for most children to achieve by the end of their fifth year. The curriculum gives children the opportunity to explore experiment, plan and make decisions for themselves, thus enabling them to learn, develop and make good progress through well planned, structured play.

The 6 areas of learning are:

Personal, social and emotional development
Communication, language and literacy
Problem Solving, reasoning and numeracy
Knowledge and understanding of the world
Physical development
Creative development

The outdoor learning environment both within the school grounds and locally is integral to delivery of the curriculum. The curriculum reacts to the needs of the children and their starting points.

Physical and mental health and well-being.

The promotion of understanding and managing pupils’ emotional health and well-being is threaded through the life of our school.

We have a designated member of staff who is the pastoral lead.

We promote healthy life styles through the following:

All children are given opportunities to complete the ‘Daily Mile’
The school promotes healthy eating through healthy snacks
There is a very well-designed P.E curriculum that leads to children developing excellent skills and competition in a range of local tournaments through excellent coaching in P.E sessions and after school clubs
Play Leaders support the lunch time supervisors in setting up and maintaining structured playtime games and social skills activities

Daily collective worship gives children the opportunity to discuss their thoughts and feelings

Enrichment
Our curriculum is enriched by;

Educational Visits including residential opportunities
Visitors
Worship / Assemblies
Extra-Curricular Clubs
Learning outside the classroom
Responding to events in the news
Charity Days & Community events
After school clubs
Theme days/weeks

IMPACT

First and foremost we want to instil in our children a love of learning and an

understanding that the learning is part of a journey they are on.

Our curriculum has an ambition for high achievement of all pupils irrespective of background and starting point.
We want them to feel safe, to express and celebrate their learning achievements and recognise their own personal and academic growth.

How we know we are successful in this is through:

Teacher assessment;-
Formative – through ongoing questioning, dialogue, verbal and written feedback, informal quizzes, practical tasks, day to day work, reasoning.
Summative – end of term/topic tests, formal assessments
Pupil Voice – pupil questionnaires, self and peer assessment, school council, learning dialogue in the classroom that encourages self-evaluation.
Parental Feedback – parent questionnaires, parent/teacher meetings, informal meetings, PTA
Data Analysis –, subject leadership, pupil progress meetings, governors, LA School Adviser, external data (SATS)
Quality Assurance – lesson observations, drop ins, learning walks, book looks
Positive Attitudes to Learning – children engaged and inspired by their learning, posing own enquiry questions, taking initiative, co-constructing the learning pathway
Respect – visibly demonstrated through their school environment, their work, interactions, moral responsibility, spirituality
Participating in Community – proudly representing their school through community events

IMPACT MEASURE: Standards

Children make progress and attain in line with or better than national expectations.

They are given opportunities to achieve the greater depth standard.

Assessment documents show that knowledge and skills are embedded throughout the curriculum.

IMPACT MEASURE: Strive for success

Children are confident and successful learners and make the right choices for their learning.

Our learning values have progression and provide challenge.

IMPACT MEASURE: Personal Development

Children demonstrate Christian values in their learning and in their behaviour in and around school.

Children learn to make the right choices for their safety.

The choices children make benefit the school and local community.

The impact of what we do and what the children achieve cannot always be measured in data sets and numbers so we always try to look holistically at the whole child.

We consider our children as individuals who are facing future challenges and ultimately leave us high school ready having enjoyed and embraced their learning experiences along the way.

We are preparing our children for their future adult lives, whatever they may be!