CURRICULUM

The Curriculum at Dacre Braithwaite CE (VA) Primary School

Planning

At Dacre Braithwaite, we plan using agreed formats for Literacy, Maths and Foundation Subjects. In order to ensure our planning is systematic we follow the National Curriculum, enhanced by White Rose maths and advice from membership to  professional bodies to ensure that the learning is systematic.

Each year group objectives are clear and known by staff and the learning for the Foundation Subjects is taught in sequenced units. (See the Long Term Plans for further detail).

Teaching

Maths and English is taught every day, generally (but not exclusively) in the mornings. Most of the Foundation subjects are taught in Block units, which are timetabled such that the term’s entitlement for each subject is taught every afternoon for approximately a period of a week to 10 days (or 2 weeks for Science and RE). This allows for the learning to be built on daily and for fewer opportunities for learning loss to occur. PE and PSHE are taught weekly throughout the year. Music and French are taught weekly in alternating half terms.

Assessment

Assessment at Dacre Braithwaite takes a variety of forms both formal and informal. Formal testing is undertaken termly using NTS Assessment tests. The results are analysed by the staff, the SENDCo and Maths and Literacy Subject leader, the latter of whom prepare regular reports for the Governing Body to inform them of the progress of different year groups across different aspects of the subjects.

In English and maths, children may be given quizzes before and after a unit of work is taught. In the Foundation subjects, children are given low stakes quizzes in various forms after a Block of teaching. These are timetabled to take place 2 and 4 weeks after the unit has been taught. The children in UKS2 also complete the quizzes before the units take place to allow the teaching to be adapted as required. The repetitive nature of the quizzes allow recall and fluency in the learning. This also allows the practice in school to continue to build on what has gone before.

Monitoring

Subject Leader monitoring takes the place of a variety of activities including shared book scrutinies in Staff meetings, lesson visits and 1:1 conversations with colleagues about planning, teaching, learning and assessment. Similarly, where Subject Leaders have attended training, ideas have been shared widely and then discussed after implementation.

Early Reading at Dacre Braithwaite

After some consideration, we have introduced Little Wandle Letters and Sounds Revised as our complete systematic synthetic phonics programme (SSP) programme. Based on the original Letters and Sounds, but extensively revised to provide a complete teaching programme meeting all the expectations of the National Curriculum and beyond to teach early reading. We have attached information and additional resources from our Little Wandle information session - please click on each image to find out more.