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Our Curriculum: An Introduction

Our curriculum principles

When the early church was forming, Saint Peter wrote in his second epistle, "Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." This has become our guiding motto and vision. At our school, we believe that children grow not only in knowledge but also in character, nurtured within our Christian setting. Saint Peter also encouraged early Christians to read and learn, emphasising the importance of understanding to grow in grace and knowledge. 

 Designed to meet the specific needs of our community, our curriculum reflects our commitment to going beyond standard requirements. It is dynamic and continuously evolving to remain relevant and effective. 

 

 Building on this foundation, our curriculum is shaped by three core principles: 
  1. Reading is at the heart of everything we do. 

We view reading as the gateway to learning, fostering growth in both grace and knowledge. 

 

  1. Developing a deep body of knowledge and cultural capital. 

Our curriculum equips children with the knowledge and skills they need to thrive in education and in life, preparing them for the future. 

 

  1. Exceeding the ambitions of the National Curriculum. 

What is our curriculum intent? 

 

Our leadership team has carefully designed our knowledge-based curriculum with the following goals in mind: 

  • Articulating subject-specific intentions. 

Clear statements of intent guide each subject area, ensuring alignment with our broader educational vision. 

  • Exceeding national expectations. 

We identify and highlight, in green text, areas where our curriculum surpasses the ambitions of the National Curriculum, the RSHE framework, the Early Years Framework, or the locally-agreed syllabus. These enhancements reflect our spiritual mission to nurture children and serve our community's needs. 

  • Defining essential outcomes. 

We set clear expectations for what children must know, understand, and do by the time they leave our school. These are captured in our outcome statements. 

Our curriculum is a living document, always in draft form and subject to refinement as we strive to provide the best for our children. 

How is the curriculum implemented?
We deliver a rigorous knowledge-based curriculum with subject teaching.  Where we make cross-curricular links, we do so.  We mainly teach in a small-steps way based on the QET principles of Teaching and Learning Excellence, themselves coming from Barak Rosenshine's work on effective teaching.
 
Here we set out the sequence of knowledge to be delivered per subject across phases in the school.
 
 
Below is an overview to show you how the subjects are organised in our 2-3 year rolling programme.  We organise it this way as we have mixed-age classes.
How do we measure impact?
 
Quite simply, we measure how much children know and remember using the assessents set out in subject booklets and schemes.  For English, Maths and PSHE, we use GL assessment to track attainment and progress.  We have mapped out over a typical year the different suites of assessments children take.  We also have mapped out Mock tests for Year 6 SATs, Phonics and Year 4 MTC.  
Curriculum Development: An ongoing process
 
Curriculum development is never-ending and evolving.  As a small school, we have to take realistic actions to develop the curriculum we offer and this document outlines the plans to implement the ambitious curriculum we have planned.  To succeed in this, we decided on joint leadership across our schools, creating booklets to implement this alongside working with external subject associations and experts. 
 
Parental Queries about our curriculum
 
If you wish to find out more about the National Curriculum, there is a guide below.  The curriculum coordinator in our school is Mr Tucker so please speak with him if you have any queries.