Curriculum Overview
Growing Strong Roots Curriculum
We have developed our curriculum over the last few years. We aim for everyone to be: a deep thinker, effective learner, confident communicator and a happy and healthy individiual who makes a positive difference. These aims drive our curriulum.
We have worked closely with other schools in Crofty MAT to create progression maps for different subject which focuses on the knowledge, vocabulary to be covered. Then as a school, we have built on these and created our own unique curriculum called ‘Growing Strong Roots Curriculum’. You find out more about why we have created our curriculum by reading our ‘Curriculum Rationale’, which can be found further down the page.
Why have we called it ‘Growing Strong Roots Curriculum’?
Like trees, children need strong roots in order to grow and blossom. We believe that children need to grow a strong base of key knowledge, concepts, skills and personal qualities. From this they can build upon and grow their branches of knowledge, skills and understanding in a variety of subjects and become lifelong learners. We feel learning is most effective when learning is linked and contributes to the bigger picture. The roots continue to grow and act as an anchor, as both staff and children, continue to grow as learners. Like trees, every child is unique. Everyone’s experience and learning will be different, but we want to provide certain key nutrients to all children and this is our curriculum. We have created a list of key experiences that we want our children to have whilst at Portreath School. Links to these documents can be found below our curriculum intent statement.
As well as our 5 aims that drive our curriculum, we have our 5 learning behaviours to help children become effective learners and 5 core values that help everyone to be happy, healthy individuals that make a positive difference:
Class Long Term Plans:
Sycamore Long Term Plans 22-24
Key-Experiences-for-the-Children-of-Portreath-School
Our Curriculum Rationale
At Portreath we have three core elements at the heart of our school: relationships, experiences, and learning. By building strong relationships, providing thought-provoking experiences and high-quality learning opportunities and texts, we set our children off on a life-long journey of learning. We have devised a curriculum that matches the ambition of the National Curriculum and has 5 key aims that drive our curriculum. We want everyone to be:
a DEEP THINKER who is a fluent reader, knowledgeable, creative and that has mastered key skills in range of subjects.
an EFFECTIVE LEARNER who demonstrates curiosity and independence, strives to improve and is a problem solver.
a CONFIDENT COMMUNICATOR who is a logophile and bibliophile.
a HAPPY AND HEALTHY INDIVIDUAL who is inclusive, celebrates diversity and feels that they belong.
a PERSON who MAKES A POSITIVE DIFFERENCE to others, the community, the environment and the world.
Portreath is a coastal town in a part of Cornwall that is considered to have areas of deprivation . The children are lucky to live in such a beautiful place, and our curriculum is partly about appreciating nature as well as preparing them for a tech-filled world. The school plays a role in ensuring our village is a wonderful place to live now and, in the future. We want the children to take what they learn in the village to make a difference to the wider world. We believe that it is very important to learn about environmental issues. The curriculum is designed to help the children to have a real sense of Cornwall’s heritage, as well as prepare them for life as global citizens. We are guided by the quote, ‘A people without the knowledge of their past history, origin and culture is like a tree without roots.’ Marcus Garvey. We want children to grow strong roots of knowledge, concepts, skills and personal qualities in order to blossom as learners, hence the name of our curriculum.
In Portreath there is a strong community spirit, but living in a coastal village also brings its challenges. Aspirations for some may need to be more outward looking. Life in the village can be quite insular for some children; it is our role to build the children’s cultural capital. We have designed a curriculum to raise aspirations within our community, as well as foster a sense of belonging. It is designed to enrich the children’s lives, ignite their imagination and spark their interest and open the children’s eyes to the fascinating wider world around them world around them. We introduce them to a diverse range of art, music, historical events and give them experiences that help shape their lives. The whole school environment is a place to learn, and we have things such as large maps, local artists work, and we have a ‘Curiosity Cabinet’ to spark talk and enrich the children’s daily experiences in school. We explicitly encourage them to value diversity. We believe powerful knowledge opens doors and it is through knowledge that children can make sense of and improve the world we live in.
Our Growing Strong Roots curriculum provides the opportunity to acquire ‘essential knowledge’. The curriculum is a progression model; it is carefully and deliberately planned and sequenced in ‘small steps’ so that new knowledge and skills build on what has been taught before. The architecture of the curriculum helps pupils to build the strong roots of knowledge and skills that can help the children grow as learners and people. It is not disconnected facts. For each National Curriculum subject the school has identified golden threads that are the key concepts that weave throughout our curriculum starting in EYFS. Within a subject, these threads link the learning across the school together and help the children to make connections. The EYFS team start to ‘plant the seed’ of these concepts and the rest of the school help these seeds to grow. We provide regular opportunities for reactivation to help pupils transfer learning to their long-term memories. As a school we also recognise the importance of responding to children’s interests and needs. We like to take advantage of experiences and opportunities that arise; these might link to local, national, or international events. We have talented and interesting people in the local area and these people can contribute to our curriculum. Although we have adopted a cross-curricular topic approach, we ensure the integrity of individual subjects is preserved. We want our children to act and talk like, for example, scientists, historians, and artists.
We recognise the importance of early language and reading as a vehicle to improve children’s communication. The teaching of systemic synthetic phonics is taught from the beginning of reception using RWI, with books that are matched to learning the sounds that children have been taught. We also invest in a rich literary environment and have chosen to embed high quality texts through our curriculum to enrich learning and develop foster a love of language and reading. Texts are carefully chosen to extend vocabulary and to understand the world around us and we have linked these texts to areas of learning across the school. We recognise the importance of securing maths skills and knowledge, then applying these, and developing reasoning skills to help them within school but also as a key life skill. We want to help them make sense of the numbers, patterns and shapes they see in the world around them, offer them ways of handling data in an increasingly digital world and help secure financial security in the long term.
Knowledge alone is not enough. Being creative and developing a good imagination are vital life skills; our curriculum includes opportunities for children to experience the creative arts. As a school we advocate everyone developing their growth mindset. Our school motto is: believe, work hard, succeed. We promote 5 learning behaviours: Being brave, ready, responsible, resilient and happy. We live out our five school values: honesty, gratitude, kindness, inclusion and empathy. We have designed the curriculum to help the children to be the kind of people who can be happy, fulfilled and successful.
To support parents we have created three information documents: End of year expectations in reading, writing and maths (RWM) for each year group (see below), class termly/half termly curriculum leaflets and knowledge organisers. These are shared with parents via Class Dojo. We would really appreciate parents helping their child to learn the words and facts on the knowledge organisers at home too. Each child has a Learning Journey Book that contains all their knowledge organisers. This is so they can refer back to them. As a school we understand the importance of revisiting and retrieving knowledge in order for it to be transferred to our long term memories and these books support this work. The children will be learning more than the things covered on the knowledge organisers and in the leaflets but these contain the key things we plan to cover. We hope parents will find them useful. More information about maths and English can be found under the relevant tabs.
Below is our curriculum intent statement. This builds on the curriculum rationale and gives some more details, including the learning schemes used.
Portreath School’s Growing Strong Roots Curriculum Intent Statement 2023-24
EYFS
The Early Years Statutory Framework is used to support an integrated approach to learning and care. The planning of learning follows the children’s interests and learning needs. Close tracking of individual children’s progress, through the use of the Early Years Foundation Profile, is carefully monitored to ensure all children make progress. For more details please see the EYFS tab under curriculum.
Information for Parents
To support parents we have created three information documents: End of year expectations in reading, writing and maths (RWM) for each year group (see below), class termly/half termly curriculum leaflets and knowledge organisers. These are shared with parents via Class Dojo. We would really appreciate parents helping their child to learn the words and facts on the knowledge organisers at home too. Each child has a Learning Journey Book that contains all their knowledge organisers. This is so they can refer back to them. As a school we understand the importance of revisiting and retrieving knowledge in order for it to be transferred to our long term memories and these books support this work. The children will be learning more than the things covered on the knowledge organisers and in the leaflets but these contain the key things we plan to cover. We hope parents will find them useful. More information about maths and English can be found under the relevant tabs.
Leaflets
Please use the links below to look at the year group expectations for reading, writing and maths:
Parent-Leaflet-Year-1-Portreath
Parent-Leaflet-Year-2-Portreath
Parent-Leaflet-Year-3-Portreath
Parent-Leaflet-Year-4Portreath