Curriculum

On this page is everything you need to know about the curriculum at Silver End Academy. We adopt a connected curriculum across the school. There is additional information regarding specific classes on the individual class pages. If you require any further information please contact the school office who will direct your enquiry to the correct person.

The Connected Curriculum

We believe that the purpose of the school’s curriculum is to educate the whole child.

They need to develop literacy and mathematical skills to enable them to make sense of the world they live in and apply these to all aspects of the school curriculum.

They need to be taught art, design and musical skills to lead to an awareness and appreciation of human achievement and the pleasure in creating.

Our children live in a variety of communities and families that are diverse, with many differences as well as things in common. The communities are made up of different sexes, different ages, different races, different religious beliefs and different cultural beliefs.

We want all children in schools in our MAT community to grow up respecting, tolerating and understanding the diversity and richness that all these different communities can offer to society. They are taught to do this to give them an understanding of life and the world that is broad and balanced and rich in experiences.

They also need to understand how their community is part of the wider community of their town, their county, their country and their world. They need geographical and historical skills, knowledge and understanding to understand how their communities evolved and are evolving.

Above all, we want our Curriculum to be exciting and engaging so that all children enjoy learning in all our schools.

Jane Bass

Connected Learning Trust CEO

 

Curriculum Intent

The breadth of our curriculum is designed to provide a holistic approach to teaching and learning, that develops ALL pupils to be independent, active learners who acquire the necessary knowledge, skills and concepts to support the next stage of their education.

When designing our curriculum, we had three goals in mind:

1. To give pupils appropriate experiences to develop as confident, responsible citizens, while broadening their ‘cultural capital’;
2. To ensure that disadvantaged and pupils with SEN do not have a reduced experience through providing a coherent, structured, academic curriculum.
3. To ensure children have the opportunity to independently apply their learning, thus imbedding the skills learnt into long term memory. Consequently, leading to sustained mastery for all and a greater depth of understanding for those who are capable.

Our subject progressions have been developed in line with the national curriculum and specifically to ensure that, as child moves through our school, from year 3 to 6, the skills and knowledge they acquire are cumulative in nature.

Implementation

Our curriculum design is based on evidence from cognitive science; three main principles underpin it:

1.            Learning is most effective with spaced repetition.

2.            Interleaving helps pupils to make links between their learning and aids long-term retention.

3.            Retrieval of previously learned content is frequent and regular, which increases both storage and retrieval strength.

Our innovative teaching staff are given context free progressions in subjects to develop their own connections and approaches to delivery. This best utilizes staff strengths and enables them to develop their own creative themes based on the needs and interests of their classes.

Our staff then follow a three stage structure:

Stage 1: Teach and model

Stage 2: Practise and rehearse

Stage 3: Independent application

Impact

The impact of our curriculum is that by the end of each year, the vast majority of pupils have sustained mastery of the content, that is, they remember it all and are fluent in it; Some pupils have a greater depth of understanding. We track carefully throughout each stage, utilizing live feedback, self and peer assessment where ever possible, to ensure pupils are on track to reach the expectations of our curriculum.

 

 

Connected Curriculum

The Connected Curriculum is a skill based Curriculum that encompasses the Foundation Subjects but interlinks the Core Subjects of English and Maths. Pupils are taught a key skill it is modelled, practised and rehearsed- in the second part of the term pupils apply the learnt concept and skills bringing their own ideas, skills and knowledge. The Connected Curriculum promotes positive learning behaviours such as the 4Rs Resilience, Reciprocity, Resourcefulness and Reflectiveness promoting aspects of team work, perseverance with learning challenges, encouraging children to review, reflect and adapt their work in light of changes. It also encourages pupils to use resources around them. The 4Rs are embedded in the Connected Curriculum. For further information see the Key Learning Model Policy.