Curriculum

Our school is a place where we can grow as a family, helping each other to lead full and happy lives.

Intent

At St Cuthbert’s, in order to deliver and inspire the highest quality education we are committed to developing and delivering our own curriculum, derived from our shared values rooted in the gospel teachings. These include:

• Delivering a broad and balanced education, committed to the formation of the whole person through simultaneously developing their physical, moral, spiritual and intellectual talents. In this way, preparing the child and young person to take an active and responsible part in society. 
• Enabling children to become confident, resourceful, enquiring and independent learners.
• Fostering children’s self-esteem, perseverance, and positive attitude to learning.
• Helping them to build positive relationships with other people.
• Developing children’s self-respect and encouraging children to respect the ideas, attitudes, values and feelings of others.
• Showing respect for all cultures and, in so doing, to promote positive attitudes towards other people.
• Enabling children to understand their community and help them feel valued as part of the community.

Our curriculum is designed and sequenced towards cumulatively developing a pupil’s knowledge and skills to support future learning and eventually employment opportunities. We follow the diocesan guidelines and framework for the teaching of our core subject of Religious Education.  We have used the Early Years Framework and the National Curriculum as our starting point in developing our broad and balanced curriculum which is delivered throughout the academic year. For children with specific educational needs, their curriculum will be designed to meet their needs.

We strive to enhance the opportunities of our children through educational visits linked to our curriculum, having visitors in to school who support the curriculum and also raise our children’s aspirations for future careers.  We use resources to promote and inspire learning, as well as striving to deepen their understanding of community through our many charitable projects and by supporting or local community.

We encourage in our children the ability to grow and develop through having a growth mind-set.  Their learning is not a straight-forward process but rather a complex journey of success and first attempts at learning where they learn from making mistakes.

Implementation:

Our programmes of study, sequence the progression of knowledge and skills in each subject area.  Teachers demonstrate a good knowledge and understanding of subjects taught, and how the curriculum design helps to ensure that children remember more over a longer period of time.  Each subject lead has redesigned their curriculum offering and these have been shared with their peers who had the opportunity to provide feedback before implementation. 

Teachers are provided with CPD opportunities to support the delivery of the curriculum.  This is sometimes delivered in house or by an external provider.

Units of study, use key questions to give a focus to the learning and make it meaningful. New knowledge and skills are explicitly taught so that children rapidly acquire new learning.  In lessons, teachers use highly effective questioning to draw out pupil understanding and identify and address common misconceptions.  Through equitable delivery, all children are supported as they explore the topic, acquire new knowledge and skills, and embed the learning.  Where necessary, teachers will consult with the SENDCo in order to ensure that learning opportunities for children with special educational needs are challenging and match their needs.

The school has worked hard to establish effective assessment systems since the removal of the national curriculum levels. The system monitors and tracks pupils’ data. Termly progress meetings take place and action plans are implemented.

Teachers ensure that reading, writing and mathematics are given a high priority in order to give children the skills they need to progress. 

Reading is given a high priority - Reception and KS1 use Oxford Reading Tree decodable books to support early reading, and this is closely matched to our phonics programme.  In KS2, the accelerated reading programme is used. Each year group has a bank of books and resources to support guided reading.  Children are given an additional book to read which encourages a love of reading.  Teachers encourage a love of reading through the daily sharing of books from a range of genres.

Teachers have a high expectation of pupil’s attitude to learning and create learning environments to support pupil’s learning (working walls, resources are available to support the learning, displays celebrating pupils work). This supports our curriculum which is sequenced towards building knowledge and skills over time for future learning and eventual employment.

We value communication with all our stakeholders. Children and parents are asked about learning and opportunities that the school provides in order that we can ensure we prepare our children for the future.  We communicate positive messages about our children through our rewards systems.  We timetable events that support our children’s physical, and mental health and well-being.   We provide opportunities for our children to take an active part in school life which supports the promotion of a happy and full life, and feeling valued as part of the community.

Impact

Teachers, Subject Leads and the Senior Leaders of the school monitor the impact of our curriculum delivery at regular intervals across the academic year to ensure learning is embedded into the long term memory of our children.  This involves discussion with our children about their learning and progress, as well as how the school supports them in staying safe and living out our school mission. 

‘Worry/talk it out’ boxes are provided for the children to share concerns and children know they are listened to. Through the School Council, Eco Council, Mini Vinnies group and school surveys, children can give their thoughts and opinions on how our school supports them in their learning and living life to the full.

Teacher formative and summative assessments, work scrutiny, lesson observations, regular professional dialogue, assessment data and curriculum reviews all play their part in helping us to evaluate the impact of our curriculum design on ensuring our children are prepared for the next stage in their learning.