Curriculum

At Giffards Primary, we believe that our curriculum should expand horizons by being broad, balanced, relevant and responsive to the needs of our pupils, meeting the needs of all children whatever their ability and helping them to develop academically, socially and emotionally for their unique journeys through life.

For us, Teaching, Learning and Assessment is an interwoven and a reflective practice, we are continually reviewing the effectiveness of our practices and our own unique curriculum; identifying strengths and opportunities for improvement.  

Curriculum Design
Intent
‘Learning is defined as an alteration in long-term memory.’ Ofsted January 2019
We designed our own curriculum around topics/themes to maximise links between subjects, these are presented as questions to encourage enquiry and support assessment. Through careful consideration of our children’s contextual needs and starting points we plan teaching sequences to ensure they are relevant, develop independent learners, are skills based, inspiring and memorable, prepare our children for the future and aspirational to ensure we raise standards.
At Giffards Primary School our curriculum is designed to develop an enthusiasm for learning, to ensure good achievement and to support pupil well-being and happiness.
Our curriculum themes take account of the legal requirements of the Early Years Foundation Stage Curriculum and the Primary National Curriculum. They have been designed to develop the skills and knowledge necessary for the next stage in the children’s education. Our values are intrinsically woven into our 4 Giffards Goals of

• Be Responsible
• Be Respectful
• Be Safe
• Be Aspirational

These four school expectations/rules promote good conduct and support pupils to develop the necessary skills for building strong relationships, celebrate diversity, encourage respect, become responsible citizens and become successful independent learners. Our curriculum provides and acknowledges success for all children. We provide learning experiences that allow children to develop interpersonal skills and build resilience. The skills and knowledge that the pupils must learn have been carefully mapped for each subject, ensuring progression within and across year groups. Many Subjects are taught discretely to ensure that subject specific skills are explicit within lessons but meaningful links are made when there are cross-curricular connections. Pupils experience trips and have experts who visit them in school. This exposure to real life experiences, puts what they have learnt in the classroom into practice. We have a rich and varied menu of extra-curricular and enrichment opportunities to engage, nurture and develop talents.

We aim for our children to:

• be confident, independent and resilient; displaying a thirst for learning
• be kind; showing empathy and compassion whilst valuing diversity
• be culturally knowledgeable about our country and our world
• have aspirations for the future and know that these can be reached through hard work and determination
• achieve academically across the entire curriculum, meeting at least the national expectation by the end of their primary education 
• to be well prepared for the challenges of the secondary school curriculum  
• to leave Giffards Primary School with a sense of belonging and pride that they have developed the confidence and skills needed to be learners for life.

How we ensure we meet our children’s specific needs 

We asked ourselves “What is it that the children at Giffards Primary School need to learn to be successful both now and in the future?”

We considered the traits we wished our children to develop and the skills they would need. In addition, we considered our local community with all it offers and how we could make our curriculum relevant to that.

We also asked what our children’s specific needs were and how these could be addressed through the curriculum. We provide equal opportunities for all children, regardless of their background and starting points, to gain knowledge, skills and character and make significant progress across the range of concepts taught in the School Curriculum.

As a result of our discussions, we produced a curriculum which is unique to our school, broad and balanced, which offers our children a superb start to their lifelong education, emphasising the development of their character alongside key skills. 

Implementation

The content and skills we teach:

Knowledge

‘The national curriculum provides pupils with an introduction to the essential knowledge that they need to be educated citizens.’ National Curriculum 2014

At Giffards Primary the curriculum is taught through discrete subjects as well as linked “themed” areas where relevant.

Each year group has a half termly ‘topic’ usually focusing on Science, geography or History. A whole school long term plan indicates the broad objectives of the national curriculum and ensures progression through the key stages, year group overviews show the links between subjects

There are schemes of work for each curriculum subject, ensuring an engaging, knowledge-rich, progressive curriculum that has clear end points that are built upon as pupils move through the school.
Where knowledge cannot be linked, it is the school’s policy that this is taught discretely
Teachers adapt plans to match the needs and ability of the children in their class. We focus on embedding the necessary deep understanding of what is being taught. To do this we create opportunities for deeper understanding where we expect pupils to reason and think. We ensure that children’s knowledge is embedded, we ensure there are opportunities for pupils to master the objectives and not just cover them. We encourage class talk which supports the thinking process, reasoning about methods and sharing insights with peers. To this end we make use of mixed ability working procedures like talk partners and mixed seating.
The ‘knowledge content’ of each subject is assessed against the National curriculum Programmes of study and forms one element of our foundation subject assessment system

Skills
‘Studies have shown that when knowledge is learned passively, without engaging skills, it is often only learned at a superficial level’ Four-Dimensional Education OCED 2015

Subject specific Skills Progression.  Each subject has identified subject specific skills, and these are set out progressively for each year group for all subjects.
The skills progression of each foundation subject is assessed against the disciplinary skills we have identified as being necessary for pupils to have the understanding needed for each curriculum subject.
In lessons, teachers plan work that is scaffolded to meet the needs of pupils but there are the same expectations for all children to achieve the learning intentions within a lesson as well as having opportunities to work at a greater depth.
Greater depth Working at greater depth means a child has mastered the learning expected for their age and stage, and is therefore able to delve into it in more detail. Children who consistently work at greater depth are confidently able to deal with increases in the complexity of how a subject is presented,
Some of the characteristics of a child who’s working at greater depth include:

• Working independently
• Applying what they’ve learned in one area of a subject to other areas
• Applying their knowledge consistently, confidently and fluently

Being able to explain what they have been doing to others, including teaching other children what they have learned.



Teaching Reading 

Reading is an important and integral part of our school curriculum. We value the importance of being a confident reader and work hard to develop and implement children’s reading skills across the whole curriculum. We want children to enjoy reading a wide range of different books and be able to talk about books and authors.

Phonics is given high priority and taught discretely from the Foundation Stage through to the end of Key Stage 1 using Monster Phonics. Any children who have not mastered phonics by the end of KS1, will continue in KS2.

KS1 - We teach explicit reading in KS1 as part of the children’s daily Monster Phonics lessons. As well as daily phonics lessons all children have 3 guided reading sessions. Each child works in a group matched by their ability and reading level. The first lesson is focused on decoding the text and understanding what they are reading. The second lesson focuses on prosody (being able to read fluently and with expression). The final lesson focuses on discussing the text and ensuring that children have understood what they have read.All children take home a reading book at their level and a story book to share. This is designed to create a shared reading experience and encourage a love of reading.

KS2 - Reading is taught daily using Reading Comprehension materials. The first lesson focuses on reading the text with confidence and prosody, the second lesson on vocabulary and the subsequent lessons on comprehension strategies. On a Friday, children are expected to complete a task with greater independence and this is used for summative assessment purposes.
As well as explicit teaching of reading, the school also promotes reading through the Reading Challenge in KS2. This is where children select colour banded books matched to their reading stage around specific topics. These books include fiction, non-fiction and poetry. They are intended to engage the children in past, present and future topics as well as covering a diverse range of backgrounds and experiences, our broad selection of reading books underpins our Intent of ‘Broadening Horizons’ and ensures children have access to books that represent the world around them. Children receive rewards for completion of the books to encourage participation. We have two libraries in KS2.

Storytelling -  We have a storytelling spine that identifies a core set of stories for each year group, considering a range of stories set in the UK and around the world, both traditional and modern, as well as non-fiction this supports our intent of Broadening Horizons. The list is refreshed regularly, at least once a year, as new books are published and to meet pupil need. By reading to children regularly we aim to:

• Increase vocabulary (reduce the language gap)
• Improve listening skills
• Develop/inspire a love of reading
• Engage children emotionally with literature through a range of diverse stories/poems
• Broaden horizons by reading from a broad range of stories that reflect different backgrounds,cultures and experiences
• Encourage/inspire pupils to read for themselves by exposing them to a range of stories available in class
• Develop cultural capital by reading a variety of classic literature

During storytelling the teacher models prosody and develops back and forth talk through discussion of the meaning, author intent, prediction etc. This models to the children how a “good” reader thinks when reading and integrates the text. This occurs daily in KS1 and at least 3 times a week in KS2 towards the end of the school day. The story telling books are often more challenging than the children would be able to independently read.

In our school, children participate in reading activities every day. These range from taught sessions to opportunities for reading for pleasure and information.  During Guided Group Reading and Shared Reading, children are taught and given opportunities to apply reading skills which include: phonics, sight vocabulary, contextual cues, comprehension, inference, deduction and fluency. Teachers use a range of carefully selected resources when teaching children to read. Every opportunity is seized throughout the day to enable pupils to use their reading skills when accessing other areas of the curriculum.

On a daily basis, teachers read aloud to the children and engage them, through active discussions, in order to promote an enjoyment of reading and to expose them to a range of vocabulary that may be beyond their current reading ability.

In accordance with the Education Endowment Foundation these approaches, “…explicitly extend pupils’ spoken vocabulary…” and “…support learners’ articulation of ideas and spoken expression…” 

Writing                                                                                                                                                                     

Through the use of The Literary Curriculum we have mapped the coverage of the entire English Programme of Study for KS1 and KS2 for Writing as well as meeting the needs of the statutory 2021 Early Years Framework.

In many cases, objectives are covered more than once and children have opportunities to apply these several times over the course of a year, as well as to consolidate prior knowledge from previous years. This approach supports children to think deeply and develop skills with depth. Planning sequences from the Literacy Tree are adapted and personalised for the needs of the children in their class.  Scaffolds and additional strategies are used to further support individual needs.   

Each unit of work lasts typically between 10 and 15 days and begins with a “hook” for example children in Year 2 discovered bowls of porridge for their work on Goldilocks, Year 3 found a message in a bottle for Cinderella of the Nile, Year 4 made buns for the Bakery by the Sea.Children at Giffards have a daily literacy lesson which includes reading a text as a whole class, exploring the themes, language features, structure and author intent. This is used to inspire and inform writing. Teachers model constructing, editing and improving texts before the children write their own.  Along with short tasks and longer writing tasks, children are given opportunities to demonstrate the skills learnt and apply ideas and vocabulary. Children are encouraged to be responsible for their learning and identify where they have included key skills by self-assessing or using their writing assessment framework, which is at the back of their books. During lessons teachers follow a I do, we do, you do approach to ensure that learning is embedded and applied successfully.

Ongoing assessment allows both teacher and pupils to keep track of their progress within their writing skills and fill in gaps. This summative assessment also informs future planning to ensure children are given every opportunity to succeed and embed skills.

Within each unit of work, children will:

• Have opportunities to participate in spoken language activities.
• Explore the features of different types of texts and modelled examples.
• Practise and improve their handwriting.
• Use relevant strategies to widen their vocabulary including accurate use of technical vocabulary.
• Experience shared and modelled writing.
• Be taught lessons in spelling, grammar and punctuation, within English lessons.
• Plan, draft, edit and up-level their writing.
• Write independently and present their writing for an audience.
• Perform or read their work to their peers or an audience.

Mathematics

We follow the White Rose curriculum (WR) which is a mastery approach to teaching maths. Through our curriculum we allow opportunities for mathematical thinking allowing children to make links between concepts which develops deeper thinking. There is also a focus on representation and structure which ensures concepts are explored using concrete, pictorial and abstract representations and the children actively look for patterns and generalise whilst problem solving.

Coherence is achieved through the planning of small, connected steps to link every question and lesson within a topic.

We follow the White Rose Long Term Plan and  ‘Schemes of Learning’ which provide sequential ‘Blocks’ of learning for each year group including EYFS and ensures a spiral curriculum throughout KS1 and 2.

Each ‘Block’ provides sequential ‘Small Steps’ towards meeting curriculum outcomes.  

There is an emphasis on number skills; these are carefully ordered, throughout our primary curriculum.

Children have a daily maths lesson.  Lessons start with time for the children to consolidate skills and key knowledge that they have previously learnt through the Flashback Four or Daily 10. Pupils develop their understanding of a concept by completing varied fluency questions and all pupils are given the chance to apply their learning to reasoning and problem-solving questions. This is to deepen their understanding of a topic enabling them to apply their learning.  

We promote a positive approach to the learning of maths; children are taught that errors and mistakes are part of learning and errors are corrected in green pen.

Every year group has a set of Key Instant Recall Facts (KIRF) to learn.  These facts are taught, rehearsed and learnt so the children know these and they can recall these instantly.

From Year 2, every child has access to TTRockstars to help the children learn the multiplication facts that are vital to much of maths and calculation.  

Teaching Music

Please check out the link here to see our 2024/25 develoment plan for Music 

Meeting Individual needs
We strive to provide a caring, supportive and stimulating learning environment in
which all children are helped to reach their emotional and academic potential. We believe Children learn best when they feel safe to take on challenges, are interested, motivated and feel valued. We recognise the importance of building positive self-esteem in children.
We adapt teaching to meet the needs of individual pupils. Teachers ‘weave’ specific approaches into every day, high-quality classroom teaching—being inclusive by design not as an afterthought.

Adaptive teaching is both carefully planned for and responsive during a lesson. At Giffards we believe that high quality teaching is the most important aspect of provision for all pupils including those with additional needs and SEND.
Pupils have opportunities to develop confidence, embed skills and work towards independence. We use fluid teaching and same day and planned interventions. We celebrate mistakes as an integral part of learning and teach pupils the importance of a growth mindset and resilience. We move learning on from the concrete to the abstract. We use feedback in the form of live marking, direct feedback and peer-to-peer discussion to support pupil’s understanding. We provide interventions for those pupils with additional learning needs including strategies such as ‘pre-teaching’. We use high quality questioning and encourage pupils to do the same. We ensure misconceptions are identified early and recognise barriers to learning and support learners through them.

Assessment
Assessment is incorporated systematically into teaching strategies in order to identify any problems and misconceptions and monitor pupil progress.
Teachers use assessment continually throughout lessons to assess how well children are learning and use this to reshape lessons as necessary.

We use the term WALT: We Are Learning To … with pupils at the beginning of every lesson to ensure that pupils understand the intention of the lesson and what is to be learned. Assessment activities based on the learning objective are built into each lesson so that teachers are informed of pupil’s progress

A ‘ping pong’ style of teaching is used so each learning objective is broken down into small steps. An I do-we do-you do approach gives children practice at embedding a skill.
Talk partners, questioning and mini whiteboards are some of the strategies teachers use to assess who has or hasn’t understood a concept/Learning objective.
Teachers ‘live mark’ in lessons as part of our instant feedback to pupils. Pupils are encouraged to reflect on feedback and edit and improve their own work. Pupils use green pen to edit work.
Teachers plan and deliver lessons from pupil’s starting points with clear learning objectives so that skills and knowledge is gained and embedded, processes in learning are understood and pupils attain and make progress. We aim for Children to apply skills independently. We are aiming for automaticity.
Each subject has clear assessments built in, these are used to adapt and inform future planning and help build a summative picture of each child’s progress and attainment over time. We use target tracker to track progress and attainment of each child.

Life skills, wider values and enrichment

The values, ethos and Life skills, wider values and enrichment - The values, ethos and approaches that underpin our teaching.       

‘Facing the challenges of the twenty-first century requires deliberate effort to cultivate personal growth and the ability to fulfil social and community responsibilities as global citizens’ Four-Dimensional Education OCED 2015

Our wider curriculum is supported by comprehensive Religious Education and PSHE schemes and these support pupils’ personal development. The school’s values curriculum comprises of personal development, encompassing mental and physical well-being and Relationship and Sex Education (SRE) and spiritual, moral, social and cultural development as well as our Giffards Goals and associated values It is the aim of our curriculum to develop responsible, respectful, active citizens.  We educate pupils about different faiths, cultural diversity, encouraging them to be inclusive of all; irrespective of age, disability, gender reassignment, race, religion or belief, sex or sexual orientation. 

We use our Giffards Goals (behaviour rules and associated values) to support our children in learning how to learnOur Giffards Goals are woven through the curriculum and along with PSHE lessons, assemblies and enrichment opportunities promote positive personal development and attitudes which reflect the values and skills needed for future learning and successGiffards Goals, Values and AimsOur values are represented by our four Giffards Goals, these are matched to associated values and are clearly understood and shared by every member of the school community.

Our Giffards Goals and values, underpin the school’s curriculum; these are embedded and celebrated within the school’s assembly themes as well as part of the ‘soft curriculum’ of adult role modelling and consistent reinforcement and referencing in lessons. 

Our values are intrinsically woven into our 4 Giffards Goals of 

• Be Responsible
• Be Respectful
• Be Safe

Be Aspirational
Our Giffards Goals and values arose out of discussion with pupils and other members of the school community, they reflect what we believe to be important about people, about how communities work well and about how we learn and develop knowledge. Our Goals and Values inform and shape how Giffards Primary School is organised, how we expect people to relate to each other in school, as well as the content and processes of teaching and learning.  Our values focus on the way we work, behave and treat all members of the school community, we recognise their importance in developing strong communities. These form the basis for how we develop strong and positive relationships within the school and in its wider community. Our Giffards Goals are displayed prominently and referred to regularly in class, lessons and assemblies. 

Personal Development and Enrichment

In addition to our well planned and comprehensive curriculum, our LSAs deliver interventions to support learning needs, SEMH and wellbeing. Our specialist teachers for PE, MfL and Music deliver a wide range of extra-curricular activities to develop and promote a love of music and sports, our children have the opportunity to perform outside of school and enter a wide range of competitions and events. All children in year 6 and have the opportunity to access a residential trip.

Our curriculum offer is designed to enhance pupils’ personal development and provide opportunities for talents and abilities to be identified and developed.

These opportunities occur not only through day-to-day teaching but through the wide range of after school clubs including art, sporting, music and well-being, often led by specialists. We encourage pupils to take on leadership roles; we have trained pupils as anti-bullying ambassadors and mental health champions.

All our year 6 pupils have positions of responsibility at lunch time.

We encourage our children to perform publicly through presenting to parents, sporting events and competitions or our choir singing at local community events and we perform at the O2 - Young Voices and the Thurrock Music Festival each year. We broaden pupils’ experiences where ever possible. We provide a wide range of school trips and field studies, enabling all pupils to broaden their Horizons and develop their understanding of and pride in their local area. 

Developing Life-long Learners

“Since we can’t know what knowledge will be most needed in the future, it is senseless to try to teach it in advance. Instead, we should try to turn out people who love learning so much and learn so well that they will be able to learn whatever needs to be learned.”   John Holt (1923 – 1985)

A life-long learner is someone who can, and does, keep learning effectively throughout their life.

Our aim is to develop successful learners who are keen, confident and able to pursue their own education and development. In order to do this, through our Giffards Goals we teach our pupils to be aspirational.  

We encourage children to develop a sense of personal growth through character development, enabling them to become global citizens and socially responsible. They will develop key characteristics through the celebration, demonstration and embedding of our values and lifelong learning approaches.

Inclusion and adaptations - leading to achievable challenge for all

In order to provide all pupils with relevant and appropriate work at each stage we

• set suitable and achievable learning challenges
• ensure pupils have the opportunities to embed key learning to aid fluency, recall and independence
• respond to pupils’ diverse and individual needs
• endeavour to overcome potential barriers to learning
• plan and adapt learning to enable children to broaden, deepen and accelerate their understanding and development of skills and knowledge
• use fluid teaching to ensure all needs are met
• run same day interventions
• use pre-teaching to prepare identified pupils for new learning
• challenge children to think at depth and deepen their learning across the curriculum.
• use AfL to identify and address misconceptions early
• use  a range of feedback strategies
• ensure our curriculum is inclusive and promotes a growth mind set in all our children, linking back to our school moto – valuing everyone as a learner
• provide additional support and interventions for children as necessary and in line with our SEND policy.

We aim for our children to

• be confident, independent and resilient; displaying a thirst for learning
• be kind; showing empathy and compassion whilst valuing diversity
• be culturally knowledgeable about our country and our world
• have aspirations for the future and know that these can be reached through hard work and determination
• achieve academically across the entire curriculum, meeting at least the national expectation by the end of their primary education
• be well prepared for the challenges of the secondary school curriculum 
• leave Giffards Primary School with a sense of belonging and pride that they have developed the confidence and skills needed to be learners for life.

Impact

To ensure our curriculum is highly effective we constantly monitor its output.

The impact of the curriculum is monitored though triangulation of outcomes: pupil and parent voice, assessment outcomes, planning, monitoring of books and displays, lesson learning walks, discussions with teaching staff, pupils and parents. Leaders, including subject leads review pupil’s outcomes, data and teaching to judge the standards of all subjects across the curriculum.

Outcomes

• Our children demonstrate confidence, independence, resilience and an enjoyment of learning.
• Our pupils develop detailed knowledge and skills across the curriculum and, as a result, achieve well. This is reflected in our results from national tests that meet government expectations.
• Our pupils with SEN and/or disabilities achieve the best possible outcomes.
• Pupils’ work across the curriculum is of good quality.
• Through the curriculum, pupils develop a good understanding of different faiths and cultures and show respect and consideration for others
• Pupils demonstrate positive relationships and are confident learners who are happy to work well together.
• Older pupils take their responsibilities seriously and act as positive role models for their younger peers. Mutual respect is highly evident.
• Pupils demonstrate courtesy and respect for one another and try to ensure that every member of the school community is considered.
• Our pupils are ready for the next stage of education. They have the knowledge and skills they need and the confidence, self-esteem and empowerment to take on their next steps.