Queens’ Federation: Curriculum Vision and Aim

Intent

At the Queens’ Federation we aim to foster ‘Learning for Life.’

We will provide a rich, relevant and inspirational curriculum that promotes a lifelong love of learning and equips our pupils with the key knowledge and understanding, skills and personal qualities that they will need to thrive in a rapidly changing world. Our curriculum is designed to be relevant to our children and is linked to the context of our school and the local community.

Integrated into our curriculum are ‘The Seven Habits of Effective People.’ These highly effective habits enable our children to develop the leadership and life skills needed to contribute positively to the world at large. At the Queens’ Federation, we believe that everyone can be a leader!

Implementation

Our topic based curriculum fully meets the statutory requirements of the National Curriculum and the Early Years Foundation Stage. Topics provide clear contexts for learning and purposeful outcomes are reached at the end of each learning journey. The curriculum is coherently planned and sequenced and enables children to build on prior knowledge, skills and experiences.  Our ‘Subject Skills’ grids break the aims of the National Curriculum into smaller steps. Subject ‘Progression Maps’ identify how key skills are built upon and developed from one year group to the next.  Key knowledge and vocabulary for each subject are identified in ‘Unit Overviews.’  We map our topics across the year to ensure appropriate coverage is given to each subject. Subjects may be taught discretely or through a blocked approach. Meaningful cross-curricular links are developed within topics and opportunities to develop key literacy and numeracy skills are promoted across all subjects. Learning is enhanced and enriched through a wide range of practical, first-hand experiences, local community visits and projects, school trips, visiting speakers, residential activities and extra-curricular activities. We firmly believe that real life experiences create lasting memories and strengthen the learning happening in school. Our curriculum meets the needs of all learners, challenging them, enabling them to think creatively and critically, problem solve and undertake learning at a deeper level. It also places a high priority on the development of self-esteem and emotional well-being and the creation of compassionate and respectful citizens.

We understand the importance of parental engagement and believe that our parents have a crucial role to play in their child’s education and work hard to create strong partnerships between home and school.

Impact

 As a result of our aim of, our children will…

• achieve the highest attainment and best possible progress that they can,
• be successful and confident learners who demonstrate the Federation values and the ‘7 Habits’ in their learning and behaviour,
• make the right choices for their safety and learning,
• be responsible, caring citizens who make a positive contribution to their community,
• understand and appreciate their own and different beliefs, ideas, values and opinions,
• demonstrate respect for themselves, each other and the world around them,
• develop a ‘lifelong love of learning.’

Our Curriculum: Year Group Plans

We teach our curriculum through topics to provide a rich context for the children’s learning and help them to make links within it. The following topics are taught in each year group:

Learning in Nursery and Reception reflects the interests, fascinations and needs of the children. Much of their learning is based on high quality texts.

Please see below for details of how our curriculum is structured year by year, subject by subject: