Curriculum

Our approach

Our curriculum takes a broad and balanced approach, whilst being personalised to incorporate our key drivers ‘Aspiration. Communication. Equality and Diversity’. This ensures that our children get the education that they need and are prepared for their next step.

At our school, we provide calm, purposeful and stimulating learning environments which foster and build on a child’s natural curiosity. Our curriculum and everything we do in school is underpinned by our three school rules: ‘Be Kind. Be Ready. Work Hard.’ Our three school rules encourage our children to work together as a team, be ready in all aspects of school life, and to enable them to reach their potential. At Somercotes Infants School we map out the key concepts for each subject area and this forms the framework in which knowledge and skills are matched at the appropriate stage. The key concepts are linked to the school’s desire to instil cultural capital in pupils. This is all documented in a progression of skills document for each subject.

Concepts are revisited as part of our retrieval strategy and also recapped in the design of knowledge organisers used at the beginning of each topic. This allows pupils to accommodate the forgetting curve and ensures that once they have been taught and understood concepts, they are not disregarded.

We have mapped out the progression of knowledge and the progression of skills for each subject and each year group. This is referred to by our staff when creating curriculum overviews and when ensuring planning matches knowledge requirements during curriculum planning.

Our curriculum drivers

We have taken time to assess the needs of our community and have incorporated these elements into our vision for our education and use these as underpinning ‘drivers’ in our curriculum. These three curriculum drivers are as follows:

Aspiration
This is embedded through our rule of ‘Work Hard’. We expect all children to work hard and apply themselves in all aspects of school life.

Communication
This is embedded through our rule of ‘Be Ready’. We ensure that reading and oracy is at the heart of our curriculum to enable children to access all parts of school life. 

• We encourage all to demonstrate good communication and interpersonal skills. 
• We encourage all to use high quality vocabulary in their speech. 
• We encourage all to promote a love of reading. 

Equality & diversity
This is embedded through our rule of ‘Be Kind’. We expect all children to be inclusive members of our school community, and to recognise and respect diversity. 

• We encourage our children to recognise similarities and differences between people and communities. 
• We encourage all to be Kind to all. 
• We encourage all to be a positive part of the school community

Phonics & Reading Schemes in Operation: Little Wandle