Curriculum Intent

At Great Corby School and Nursery, we encourage each individual child to become a successful life-long learner by igniting their curiosity, developing their love for learning, and instilling a desire to achieve. Our Curriculum offers our children opportunities for creativity, problem solving, challenge and enjoyment, while developing their resilience, confidence and respectful relationships with others including British Values. We are proud that our curriculum enriches the lives of our whole school community and gives our children the skills, confidence, and self-belief to lead a happy and fulfilled life. We encourage pupils to aim high and work towards their goals and be aspirational for their future as well as enlightening them to new possibilities and understanding of the wider world around them. Our Curriculum has been designed with a strong focus on the Early Years. We follow the Early Years Foundation Stage which focuses on play being an integral part of the curriculum. It recognises that through supported play children can explore, develop, and use their curiosity and imagination to help them make sense of the world in a secure environment. They practise skills, build up ideas and concepts, think creatively and imaginatively and communicate with others as they investigate and solve problems. Throughout school we ensure our curriculum covers all aspects of the National Curriculum, offering progression in all subjects from Year 1 to Year 6 allowing us to embed our values of ‘igniting their curiosity, developing their love for learning and instilling a desire to achieve’.

Our spiral and cumulative curriculum has been planned to be cumulative and revisited. This enables us to make the most of opportunities for children’s learning to be repeated, embedded, and secured through each subject. Regular quizzing is used to revisit taught knowledge and skills and there is a strong focus on developing children’s understanding of key vocabulary. Staff consider not only what their year group’s expectations are but what learning precedes it and what follows in order to secure clear progression for children in each subject area.

The teaching of English and Maths takes place every morning in school and children also have daily opportunities to take part in reading activities. In most other areas of our curriculum, learning takes place in immersive units during the afternoon sessions where children may be focusing on a historical period, geographical study, or artistic style over a number of afternoons. Some subjects such as P.E. and P.S.H.E. are taught discreetly each week.

Class teachers, SLT and SENDCo routinely monitor and evaluate the progress of pupils within and across lessons using EYFS and the National Curriculum to make judgements and plan actions. They use this information to evaluate how effectively pupils are achieving or exceeding expectations and to adapt planning and overviews accordingly. Teachers provide Subject Leaders, SLT and SENDCo with timely summative information about outcomes of pupils in their class. Subject Leaders and the SLT implement monitoring and evaluation to routinely measure impact and outcomes for areas of responsibility. They use evaluations to identify and plan next steps that develop the quality of provisions across both the EYFS and National Curriculum.