The Curriculum
The National Curriculum specifies five Key Stages in relationship to the period of
compulsory education (from 5 years to 16 years of age).
These are:
Foundation Stage (3-5 years) Key Stage 1 (5-7 years) Key Stage 2 (7-11years)
Key Stage 3 (11-14years) Key Stage 4 (14-16years)
Key Stages 1 and 2
The Core Subjects are:
English, Mathematics, Information and
Communication Technology, Science and RE (Voluntary Aided School).
The Foundation Subjects are:
Design & Technology, History, Geography, P.H.S.E., Music, Art and Physical Education.
There are arrangements for formally assessing the pupils’ performance according to
the levels of attainment and against the appropriate level descriptions at the end of
each Key Stage. In addition to the formal assessment, teachers are constantly
assessing the understanding and progress of the children.
These eleven subjects, together with Religious Education, make up the curriculum
provided by our school. In addition, cross curricular themes, dimensions and skills are
identified. These include citizenship, health education, environmental education,
European awareness, economic and industrial awareness. Relationship education, Personal, Health and Social
education, equality of opportunity and multicultural education are included in our
school’s curriculum.
It is intended that the National Curriculum should not be the whole
curriculum offered by the school, although it will be the majority of it, and that the
entire curriculum provided should be broad and balanced in nature.
Special Educational Needs and Disabilities
Our school aims to meet the individual educational needs of all its pupils but it seeks to
balance the needs of individuals with the needs of the other children in the school. The
school also recognises that the presence of pupils with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities can provide an opportunity for the children to develop positive attitudes towards those whose needs are different.
The Special Educational Needs Co-ordinator, Mrs Embley-Peers, co-ordinates the day-to-day
provision for any children with Special Educational Needs in consultation with the class
teachers and external agencies. All teachers will ensure that children who have Special
Educational Needs are identified at the earliest opportunity. In assessing a child's
needs our school will follow the model outlined by the Department of Education's SEND Code of Practice 2014, involving parents closely in this process. The children will
follow the National Curriculum, as far as possible and will join in with their classmates
in their day-to-day activities. They will be monitored closely and reviewed regularly.
Homework
The greatest help parents give is to take an active interest in their child's work, often
by helping with a piece of research which interests the child, or by listening to the
child read for a few minutes each evening and discussing the story.
We believe that children should be encouraged to have wide interests at this stage of their
development, being members of Cubs or Brownies or Swimming Clubs can be of great
benefit to them, as is enjoying evenings at home with the family. All pupils are given
homework which is intended to enrich and broaden their education and to reinforce
topics covered in lesson time. This will include the learning of spellings, timestables and number
bonds. Children are given written homework on a regular basis. All children from Year 1
onwards also take home spellings and mental math timestables to learn
All pupils have work to do at home with their family in relation to the
mathematics being covered in class.