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Curriculum
Home | Learning | Curriculum
Curriculum
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Vision
Belvedere Infant School
Curriculum Rationale
Our school curriculum reflects our strong belief that all children have an entitlement to an exciting and inspiring curriculum that engages children.
A curriculum that gives children new experiences that broaden and deepen their understanding.
A curriculum which has been designed to specifically meet the needs of our community of learners by exploring language and vocabulary, modelling correct speech and grammar and exploring the world through speaking and listening.
Curriculum rationale
Intent
At Belvedere Infant and Nursery School we believe that children learn when they are interested and fully immersed, so we create exciting themes, environments and challenging activities, giving them fantastic and memorable experiences. We allow children to take risks in a safe environment and help them learn from their mistakes. We believe strongly in building relationships between the children and their peers and model conversation and interactive play.
As children progress from EYFS into Key Stage One we build on their learning to refine their key skills in reading, writing and maths and we begin to make clearer distinctions between subject specific skills. By the end of KS1 we aim for every child to have the knowledge, skills and understanding to take on the broader, deeper curriculum in KS2.
We have a strong focus on oracy and building speech and language skills so that children are able to distinguish between different sounds before beginning discrete phonics teaching. We ensure that we support our children with EAL by using digital platforms that translate and by providing pre learning packs to send home to help with key vocabulary. Reading is of high importance and alongside phonics we immerse children in books, storytelling and developing interests through reading about them.
From the moment the children enter Belvedere Infant School we promote The Pioneer Academy’s values of “Safe, Happy, Learning.”
Implementation
To ensure children become fully immersed and engaged with the learning we provide experiences by making lessons practical wherever possible. Creating themes that children can become absorbed in. The children are always ‘doing’ and ‘experiencing’ and this love of learning continues as children broaden their interest in these themes by choosing to complete further learning at home.
In KS1 we use suggested themes (units) from the International Primary Curriculum (IPC). Some examples of these are: Time Travellers, The Magic Toymaker and The Circus is Coming to Town.
As part of this learning we begin with an entry point in which children become fully immersed in the subject of the unit, perhaps dressing up, or exploring with all senses involved, including tasting, touching and smelling. Investigating the new unit. Then comes the knowledge harvest so children can share what they already know and so teachers can build on this bank of knowledge and ensure progress within the curriculum subjects. The theme finishes with an exit point. This exit point has two main purposes. First, to help children pull together their learning of this unit and second to celebrate the learning that has taken place. The celebration can take many forms such as a performance to parents, a gallery of art work, a tea party hosted by the children.
As part of the themes we also aim to visit places outside of school that also create immersive and memorable experiences, or alternatively invite visitors to school either virtually or in person. These are particularly important to us as we also aim to improve our children’s cultural capital. We want our children to know about their local community as well as the wider world and so this is threading through our curriculum.
Extra-Curricular – The Pioneer Pupil Passport
Each child has a Pioneer Passport that offers 7 memorable experiences by the age of 7. This provides an opportunity for our children to participate in engaging activities within school. It continues into the junior school.
The Education Journal Cultural Capital
Teaching Times Cultural Capital
Our Curriculum Impact – How do we ensure that children are learning the curriculum?
At Belvedere Infants we strive for all our learners to make rapid progress from their starting points. We use assessment for learning to see where children may have gaps in their learning so we can quickly address this through quality first teaching as well as one to one and small group interventions. We want all children to make progress academically, emotionally, creatively, socially and physically.
We see the importance of children working collaboratively with their peers and teachers. They use discussion to develop their questioning and thinking skills. We aim for all children to become self-regulated learners. Specific lessons make certain that they are aware of how to keep themselves safe and how the school plays a role in this.
We also see the benefit of teachers collaborating and learning from each other. We provide CPD opportunities for staff that include team teaching and observing each other. We also have specialist teachers in PE and Computing who also collaborate with the other teachers to share expertise and knowledge.
Teachers are aware of the knowledge, understanding and skills needed for the next stage of the children’s education and so make sure that they are secure and fully embedded in the skills they need in their current year.
We ensure disadvantaged pupils and SEND pupils are monitored carefully and ensure every child is able to access the curriculum through differentiation and an individualised approach. We have want to ensure that all children and families have equal opportunities. Many of our families have English as an additional language and so we seek ways to support them also.
In partnership with our families we aim to promote in our children a love to learn which will last a lifetime.
Our exciting and inspiring curriculum, based on assessment and the needs of every child ensures that our children achieve high levels of attainment in the speaking and listening, reading, writing and maths readiness to that that they have a very strong foundation for the next stage of their learning.
Belvedere Junior School
Intent & Impact
At Belvedere Junior School we provide a rich and meaningful learning experience for all our learners. In designing our curriculum, we aim to not only maximise the natural and man-made resources around us, but to build directly on the experience, needs and interests of our children, as well as the expertise of the staff. We take into account the cultural and social diversity of all our community, therefore creating opportunities for all to succeed. This is a curriculum for us, by us.
Our aim is to ensure a love of learning and thirst for knowledge which will last a lifetime. This is a vocabulary rich curriculum, designed to make links across subjects and the wider world. Our curriculum reflects our strong belief that all children have the entitlement to a broad and memorable learning experience which has been designed to ensure our children thrive and are resilient in an ever changing world. Our curriculum is based on the National Curriculum Framework. We use The International Primary Curriculum to enrich our curriculum and to provide our learners with a clear process of learning within the specific learning goals designed to create interconnectivity between subjects and topic drivers.
Implementation
Our children have high aspirations and a clear viewpoint of themselves within the local and global community. There are key values which lie beneath our subject areas. They are integral to our philosophy of teaching and learning. Our curriculum develops thinking skills, communication skills, creativity, enterprise, questioning and presentation, all which are transferable skills. We teach these skills across the curriculum, and discretely through Philosophy for Children (P4C), IPC, Mindfulness and SMSC. We further enrich this provision by working with groups outside our school such as: Young Voices, The British Council, Bird College, MindUp, BFree Sports and Good2BMe. We want our children to understand how the brain works, how to identify and handle problems, and how to see themselves as part of the global community; a viewpoint which shifts between “me”, to “we” and to “us”.
We celebrate the wealth of knowledge within the learners in our school; over 24 languages are spoken in Belvedere Junior School. Because we are a multilingual school we harness these skills. Through teaching Spanish, we provide our children with the opportunity to further enhance and expand upon their love of language and their understanding of the global community. We celebrate faith, diversity and languages within the school community and develop links between the school and our wider community through coffee mornings, community days, productions and celebrations such as Black History month, International Women’s day, World Book day, Easter, Diwali, Ramadan, Chinese New Year and World Mental Health day, through this we open doors to our global community and see our school as a hub for the local community.
Through specialist teaching in music, children learn a variety instruments including percussion (drums, xylophones, cymbals and claves), recorders and keyboards whilst also singing a range of music. Our children also have an opportunity to work with Bird College to learn additional instruments such as guitars, trombones and the trumpet. All children take part in a weekly singing assembly and we have an active school choir, who have been part of the Young Voices performance for the past three years. Our computing specialist ensures our children have access to a wide range of key programming units. We strive to further home school links through the use of technology in home learning.
We believe that being active and fit builds a happy and healthy future both physically and mentally for our children. Our PE curriculum is delivered by a specialist coach and the online system, PE Pro, is also used by teachers to further enrich the delivery of PE and develop outstanding practice. We also offer a range of after school clubs such as dance, steel pans, football, table tennis, netball, computing, chess and gardening.
Pioneer Pupil Passports
We are passionate in our drive in ensuring that children are exposed to a range of opportunities and experiences in their time in Belvedere Junior School. The Pioneer Pupil Passport allows us to map key cultural, sporting, and skill based experiences through the children’s junior school time.
Eleven by Eleven
- Year 3: Visit a museum or art gallery, visit a stately home or a castle, visit a beach and paddle in the sea
- Year 4: Visit a zoo or a safari park, attend a sporting event at a professional stadium and learn to play and perform a musical instrument
- Year 5: Experience a theatre, learn a non-curriculum sport and visit famous landmark in the capital city
- Year 6: Learn to cook a healthy meal and perform a Shakespearian play on a stage.