Our Curriculum Intent

At St. Joseph’s we have designed our curriculum with pupils’ learning at the centre with the aim of ensuring that all pupils make progress and prepares our children for the ever-changing world that they will grow into. It provides enriching experiences to develop and foster a love of learning for all our children. We want our pupils to be active learners, become creative and critical thinkers.

We are a small school and our curriculum is broad and balanced and designed by all our team with our pupils in mind, to meet their needs and build on their interests. It meets the statutory requirements of the National Curriculum. (2014) If you want to know more about the National Curriculum we follow you can use the following link. https://www.gov.uk/national-curriculum

As a Catholic School, the teachings of the gospels are at the centre of everything we do. Our Mission Statement ‘With Jesus at the centre of all we do and say’ underpins our curriculum and all we do at St. Joseph’s.

Physical and mental well being are prioritised within our curriculum allowing pupils to exhibit spiritual, social and cultural understanding, and recognising the valuable contribution and positive impact of sport and the arts.

Our Curriculum Design Principles

• Sequenced and Connected: Knowledge and skills are carefully sequenced and progressively built over time. REgular opportunities for retrieval, applicationand meaningful connection support long-term learning.
• Evolving and Responsive: The curriculum is reviewed through assessment, pupil voice and educational research to ensure relevance and effectives for all leaerners. 
• Ambitious for All: High expectations, adaptive teaching and appropriate challenge ensure every pupil can achieve success and realise their God -given potential.
• Strong Foundations: Reading, writing and maths remain central, providing the knowledge and skills required for success across the wider curriculum.
• Oracy Rich: Purposefulopportunities for talk,discussion,debate and presentation develop vocabulary, confidence and communication across a range of contexts. 

Curriculumn Intent

• To provide a knowledge-rich, coherent and ambitious curriculum that enables every child to know more,remember more and do more.
• To nurture pupils faith, wisdom and virture so that they live out the Gospel values and contributepositiively to society.
• To develp confident readers, writers,mathematicians and communicators who are prepared for the next stage of education.
• To ensure equality and inclusion through adaptive teaching and high ecpectations for all learners,including disadvantaged pupils and those with SEND.
• To broaden horizons through enriching cultural, artistic, sporting, and personal development opportunities.

Curriculum Implementation

The curriculum design ensures that the needs of individual and small groups of pupils can be met within the environment of high quality first teaching. The delivery of the curriculum takes place within school, outside in our extensive school grounds or at external locations. Opportunities are sought within the curriculum to encourage strong community links.

The curriculum is designed in a blocked approach to ensure coverage and progression. The objectives are planned in a weekly format in response to the pupils needs incorporating a variety of differing approaches to teaching and learning.

Our Feedback and Marking policy is implemented consistently, opportunities are provided for pupils to reflect on their learning and think deeply and carefully about their feedback.   

Our curriculum delivery in sports is enhanced by specialist coaches that deliver high quality provision for all pupils. In addition, we have identified that some of our pupils need additional support with developing resilience and skills to reduce anxiety.

We are committed to the broadest educational offering, and that means looking beyond the National Curriculum and enables the development of the whole pupil, whatever their ability. A successful enrichment programme is offered through school trips, visiting specialists, themed days and weeks and clubs.

Reception Curriculum (to be read in conjunction with the EYFS Policy)

In Reception, we follow the Early Years Statutory Framework for the Early Years Foundation Stage, published in March 2014 by the DfES. This Framework specifies the requirement for learning and development in the Early Years and provides specific areas of learning we must cover in our curriculum.

These areas are:

• Personal, Social and Emotional Development;
• Physical Development;
• Communication and Language development;
• Literacy;
• Mathematics;
• Understanding the World;
• Expressive Arts and Design.