Our Curriculum 

Intent

We want our curriculum to be ambitious, coherent and meaningful. Our curriculum has been designed to ensure each and every child can live ‘life in all its fullness’ by offering memorable and engaging learning experiences for all our children, underpinned by our Christian vision and values. It is continually evolving.  In essence, alongside securing the knowledge, understanding and mastery of the National Curriculum (what we learn), it is designed with the intent to develop our hearts and character (who we are), our behaviours and attitudes (how we live) and our moral compass (where we fit into the world). In order to be prepared for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of life in modern Britain, when our children leave us, we want them to be:

These are our aspirations for all children who attend Marchwood C of E Infant School and are the golden threads that weave through subjects, key stages and extra curricular provision. 

Implementation 

Our aim is to bring learning alive. Our integrated curriculum provides a context for rich, exciting and memorable learning experiences planned within half-termly topics. Topics are planned as learning journeys which motivate the children with an exciting ‘hook’ and finish with an ‘outcome’ to provide a real purpose and audience.

Implementation Strategies

A connected curriculum: English, History, Geography, D&T, Art, Music, Computing and Science are connected by a theme.  This helps children make links in their learning; learning is not compartmentalised and children can apply what they have learnt across different subject areas. Well-being, SMSC and RSE and P4C are threaded through the curriculum. There is discrete teaching of subjects where needed, such as Maths, R.E, Computing and P.E. Our curriculum is informed by the National Curriculum framework in KS1 and Development Matters Guidance and the EYFS Framework in the Early Years Foundation Stage.

Sequenced: a progression of skills, knowledge and understanding is carefully mapped over time. This ensures learning builds on prior learning and ensures coverage and progression in all subject areas. Content and timing are carefully considered – why this, why now? Cognitive load is considered as part of this sequencing.

Recursive: key skills are repeated in more demanding contexts within and across years and there is regular retrieval of knowledge to support the children in making links in their learning. This spaced practice develops fluency with new repetition of skills (practice) and repetition in different contexts (transfer of skills).  This supports the development of long term memory.

Accessible and appropriately challenging: working memory has a limited capacity and so we are always considering ways to reduce cognitive load. Recalling prior learning and linking new learning to this, can help children process information in their working memory so that it is stored in the long term memory. We consider the difficulty of what is being taught and the accessibility of tasks and materials to ensure these don’t overload working memory. Task design and access points meet the needs of the learners and allow all children to make progress. Learning is scaffolded and we make use of an “I do, we do, you do” approach to model learning. An appropriate level of challenge helps to develop pupils’ self-regulation and metacognition (knowledge of how they learn - their knowledge of themselves as a learner, of strategies, and of tasks).

Practical: We believe real experiences help children learn best. Children can experiment and learn from their own experiences and mistakes and apply these in context. This supports us to develop and foster a growth mindset and we are continually reinforcing that mistakes help us learn.

Immersive: rich, exciting and memorable experiences with a ‘hook’ and purpose for learning are planned for each learning journey. The learning journey concludes with an outcome for a real purpose and audience.

Impact

Please visit our Year Group pages under the Children menu to see some of our outcomes.