EXCELLENCE - RESPECT - OPPORTUNITY - CREATIVITY - CHALLENGE

Edgebury Primary School Curriculum Intent

At Edgebury we aim to equip our children with the knowledge and skills they need to succeed throughout their life. We provide an engaging, creative and relevant curriculum which is designed to provide both motivation and challenge.

Our diverse curriculum connects subjects thereby giving a range of opportunities and a balance of both knowledge and skills. We also believe it is important learners understand which subjects they are learning and explore within them the distinctive features concerned with the subjects.

In addition, we celebrate our own special school identity and aim to address any social disadvantage therefore our curriculum reflects the school’s local context by addressing typical gaps in our children’s experiences, knowledge and skills.

Children are consulted, listened to and fully involved in their learning.

Learning and Life skills, a complementary programme, forms an integral part of the curriculum at Edgebury, ensuring our children are prepared for life so they become responsible citizens of the future. This develops skills and personal and social competencies alongside and across all curriculum areas.  

Our Connected Curriculum is implemented through a structured framework of Learning Units. These are planned and sequenced so that new knowledge and skills build upon what has been taught before. Thus, our children are able to make enduring connections to foster understanding and integrate new knowledge into their long-term memory.

Science, History, Geography, D&T and Art  are connected by theme and mapped to the requirements of The National Curriculum in England Framework Document for KS1 & KS2; the Early Years Foundation Stage Learning Units are aligned to the Development Matters guidance and statutory Early Learning Goals/Early Years Outcomes. Each Learning Unit has one or two focus subjects. For example, when history is the focus subject of a Learning Unit then this is the time to ‘get under the skin’ of the skills and deepen understanding of what it is to be a historian. RE, music, computing, PE and Languages are taught as discrete subjects but, where relevant, meaningful links and opportunities are made to our Connected Curriculum. Opportunities to develop the use of ICT as a tool to support learning and links to programming activities are taken. The explicit teaching  of computing and music is taught through the Kapow schemes of work, RE through the Discovery RE scheme and PE through Get Set 4 PE. (Please see subject pages for further information.)

Time is spent broadening learners’ knowledge of specific vocabulary and most importantly providing many opportunities to explore meanings and use new words. At Edgebury we believe that a wide vocabulary is one way to deepen understanding and that the accurate use of words supports the understanding of concepts.

English and Mathematics are taught discretely, however opportunities are always taken where reading, writing and mathematics skills can be further developed through the topic unit context according to the needs of our learners.

For further information about the curriculum our school is following, please contact Ms. H D'Arcy (Deputy Head & curriculum lead) via the school office.

See https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/national-curriculum for more information on the National Curriculum