Curriculum
The curriculum should enable pupils to think creatively and critically to solve problems and make a difference for the better. It should give them the opportunity to become creative, innovative, enterprising and capable of leadership to equip them for their future lives as workers and citizens.
"The curriculum is carefully designed to interest and motivate pupils as well as teach them the important skills and knowledge that they need."
Ofsted
2018
Our Curriculum Intent
At Our Lady of Lourdes every child is recognised as a unique individual made in the image of God. As a Catholic school, Religious Education is at the heart of all that we do and is the core of our curriculum. We place RE at the centre of our Catholic school to help us fulfil our mission to educate the whole child. We celebrate and welcome differences within our school community and seek to provide a curriculum that is knowledge based, preparing children for the next stage of their lives and also broad and diverse in terms of subjects being offered. We understand the centrality of reading in supporting children’s wellbeing and progress; overtime, we will build our curriculum around a diverse spine of high quality texts in each year group thus supporting life-long learning and a love of literature.
The ability to learn is underpinned by the teaching of basic skills, knowledge, concepts and values. We constantly provide enhancement opportunities to engage learning and believe that childhood should be a happy, investigative and enquiring time in our lives where there are no limits to curiosity and there is a thirst for new experiences and knowledge. We aspire to create a curriculum that makes happy and vivid memories. We use Learning Characters to promote positive attitudes to learning which reflect the values and skills needed to promote responsibility for learning and future success.
A Broad and Diverse Curriculum
Please see individual year group pages under the “Classes” menu (also under the “Curriculum” tab) for a detailed overview of the curriculum for that year group. Overviews of progression within each subject from Reception to Year 6 are found on our Curriculum Subject Progression Maps page. For further information on the National Curriculum, please follow this link.
We aim to focus on raising standards while not being afraid to combine that with making learning fun, combining excellence in teaching with enjoyment of learning.
The Creative Curriculum has been organised into integrated topics running on a two year cycle. Each topic has been given a key focus; e.g., Swords and Sandals = History; Storms and Shipwrecks = Science, Amazonian Adventure = Geography, and links have been made to other curricular areas within the topic and curricular focus.
Opportunities for Speaking and Listening are optimised and basic skills are delivered through this holistic approach to teaching.
The use of ICT is encouraged in all topic areas as a subject in its own right and in both the teaching of the topic and in the opportunities for children’s independent learning.
Each class teacher is responsible for the delivery of the curriculum through a ‘topic based’ approach which incorporates key skills as set out in the National Curriculum and the Literacy Framework. Although links can be made with all subjects, the following subjects are taught as dedicated, discrete sessions:
- Numeracy – Maths skills are key to developing everyday skills although links can be made to the curriculum through data handling, position, measurement, especially in Science, DT and Geography.
- Aspects of Literacy – Phonics, Guided Reading and Handwriting are taught as discrete subjects as they build up basic skills.
- RE – in accordance with the school RE guidance and diocesan guidelines although links with topics have been made where appropriate. View this term’s topics and suggested home activities here.
- PE –. supported by the National Curriculum, although links with topics have been made where appropriate
- MFL – French – supported by the Primary Framework and L.A schemes of work and links with topics made where possible.
Teaching staff are encouraged to broaden the experience of the topics for the children through off-site visits, visitors into school and shared experiences of the wider school community, e.g., involvement with parents and school links etc.
Children’s achievements are celebrated regularly through the school newsletters, displays in classrooms and shared areas, structured play and interactive displays and opportunities where children are encouraged to share their knowledge with the rest of the school/ class.
Examples of work in Science:
Examples of work in Maths:
Examples of work in English:
Examples of work in History:
Investigating Stone Age poo
