Curriculum Intent Statement

At Guilden Morden CofE Primary Academy we want our children to develop a passion for learning, curiosity in the world around them, local and global awareness, and life skills. Our curriculum is centred around our four core values of friendship, courage, respect and love that are unified with our Christian vision for education of ‘together we work to succeed and flourish’.

We have developed a well-sequenced, knowledge-rich curriculum based on the Primary Knowledge Curriculum (PKC). The principles of our knowledge-rich curriculum are:

• Knowledge is valued and specified
• Knowledge is well sequenced
• Knowledge is taught to be remembered

As a partner school of the PKC, the content in our curriculum has been carefully chosen by subject experts and has been sequenced in a meaningful way that enables children to make connections and progress from unit to unit, term to term and year to year. We recognise and value each subject and teach them discretely, ensuring that our children develop a deep understanding and love of each distinct discipline. Where appropriate, links are made across disciplines to enable children to make meaningful connections At Guilden Morden we have adapted the PKC to meet the needs of our children, and where appropriate local links have been established to create a connection to their community.

Within our curriculum, we specify exactly what we teach in each subject and communicate this with our staff, parent and governors. Our intended curriculum I planned through these key documents:

Curriculum Maps

Outlines the units covered in each subject across the year

Curriculum Rationale

Sets out our approach to curriculum and our values for each subject

Unit Rationales

Outlines the substantive knowledge, concepts and disciplinary knowledge taught in each unit, and how each unit fits in with the overall school curriculum

Knowledge Organisers

Outline some key knowledge and vocabulary that we want children to remember

Knowledge Goals

Assessment goals set out in our planning documents for each subject (knowledge goals explain what we plan for all children to know by the end of each lesson, and the assessment shows what we expect children to commit to long term memory by the end of the unit)

Implementation

For how our curriculum is implemented across our school please see the following curriculum maps:

Our intended curriculum is translated over time in the classroom following a structured approach. Teachers are provided with detailed documents for each unit, prepared by subject specialists, to support with subject knowledge and planning. This ensures every teacher has secure subject knowledge and reduces workload, enabling teachers to spend more time thinking about how to create effective lessons to support their class using a consistent structure.

Each lesson starts with a prior learning review, where children are supported to retrieve prior knowledge and make connections. We have an emphasis on explicitly teaching vocabulary, and each lesson starts with introducing, orally rehearsing, and engaging with key vocabulary (e.g., looking at the etymology of new words). Key vocabulary is contextualised throughout the lesson and children are given opportunities to apply new words. Our teachers facilitate our intended curriculum using research-based pedagogy, such as Rosenshine’s ‘Principles of Instruction’, to ensure information is presented in small steps, clearly explained and modelled, and children have many opportunities to talk, answer questions, explain their learning and work independently. Throughout lessons, teachers assess/monitor pupil responses (e.g. through questioning, written and oral responses, Multiple Choice quizzes, using key knowledge goals) and provide effective feedback.

Impact

As we have clearly specified what we want our children to know and remember, when reviewing impact, we use our intended curriculum to assess whether children can remember what we set out for them. SLT and subject leaders carry out a monitoring cycle through learning walks, pupil voice, and book looks, formative and summative assessments to assess the impact of our intended curriculum and inform next steps or areas for development which are shared with the staff and link governors. This monitoring informs the ongoing cycle of School Development planning and CPD need.