Coppice Farm Primary School

INTENT - what does the D&T curriculum intend to do?

We intend for our design and technology curriculum to build secure knowledge and skills.

Our design and technology curriculum is planned to ensure children have secure disciplinary and substantive knowledge, and a strong skillset that they can use throughout their lives. Throughout the school, lessons follow a specific progression to build on skills and learning and carefully planned retrieval tasks embed prior knowledge. We offer a ‘hands on’ approach and allow children to have an active role in their learning.

We intend for all children to be creative and critical thinkers who work together collaboratively.

Through our school values of positivity and creativity, children are encouraged to be creative and critical thinkers who can plan, design and evaluate their work, reflecting positively on their learning journey. Through group tasks and designs, pupils learn to communicate effectively and respectfully, sharing roles and responsibilities. Children identify real life problems and design solutions that build confidence and independence.

We intend for our curriculum to support every child to succeed.

Teachers set high expectations and deliver high quality teaching, removing any barriers to learning. All lessons are planned to support all learners, including SEN pupils and those from disadvantaged backgrounds, through adaptive practice and adult modelling. Activities and designs are adapted and supported by a range of tools to meet diverse needs.

IMPLEMENTATION – How is the curriculum implemented?

We use KAPOW to support our teaching and learning of D&T at Coppice Farm.

Children explore key concepts as they move through the school. Our curriculum is laid out in such a way that the children will initially learn about their Design Technology encompassed in their knowledge and understanding of the world. This will be a starting block in EYFS and built upon as they enter Key Stage 1. Once this is consolidated, they will gain a wider experience of the designing, making and evaluating of products. As a child moves through our school, their knowledge and understanding will deepen as it would have been built on the foundations laid in the previous years. The concepts that children explore are revisited in different units that include mechanisms, electrical systems, food & nutrition, textiles and structures (more information on these strands below), allowing children to apply new knowledge to the concept in order to prepare them for future learning and life. 

This is implemented through:

• A well thought out, whole school, yearly overview of the D&T curriculum which allows for progression across all year groups in all areas of D&T (textiles, mechanisms, structures, food and electrical systems)
• Each project from Year 1 to Year 6 addressing the principles of designing, making, and evaluating and incorporating relevant technical knowledge and understanding in relevant contexts.
• Well planned and resourced projects providing children with a hands-on and enriching experience
• A range of skills being taught ensuring that children are aware of health and safety issues related to the tasks undertaken
• Teachers having detailed medium-term plans which they can deliver weekly or in a block of lessons to allow the time needed for the children to be critical, inventive and reflective on their work.
• Pupils being introduced to specific designers, chefs, nutritionists, etc. helping to engender an appreciation of human creativity and achievement and increase the cultural capital from which they can draw in the future.

IMPACT - what progress will Children make?

Children will have clear enjoyment and confidence in Design and Technology that they will then apply to other areas of the curriculum. Through carefully planned and implemented learning activities the pupils develop the creative, technical and practical expertise needed to perform everyday tasks confidently and to participate successfully in an increasingly technological world. They gain a firm foundation of knowledge and skills to see them equipped to take on further learning in High School.

At Coppice Farm we are able to measure the impact that Design & Technology has had for all children by;

• Assessment by the class teacher, throughout lessons to determine the extent to which objectives are met and a summative assessment at the end of each unit.
•  Feedback to the Design and Technology lead to inform of any further areas for curriculum development, pupil support and/or training requirements for staff.
•  The creative outcomes across the wider curriculum. 
•  Interviewing the pupils about their learning (pupil voice).
•  Regular book reviews by the Design & Technology lead and opportunity for discussions with class teachers on their children’s work.