CHURCH AVENUE
A LOOK AT
Church Avenue’s Curriculum
Intent
It is extremely important to us that the pupils at The Avenues are happy and are placed at the heart of everything we do. We recognise that every child is unique, and we celebrate their success in the most meaningful way for that child.
Our core values are the ethos and culture for all. We want our pupils to be curious, with the ability to work together, and to be nurtured throughout their journey at school.
Together we will open the door for a journey of self-discovery, so that all our children blossom and grow and find their place in the world.
Our aim is to encourage and nurture our children throughout their own unique and personal journeys by:
- Scaffolding foundations for positive behaviour and social interaction
- Modelling and facilitating communication and language
- Encouraging self-help and independence
- Working collaboratively with families and professionals
We focus on the skills and knowledge that our pupils need for life and ensure that children learn and develop well, are kept healthy and safe have the knowledge and skills they need to access the curriculum.
CURIOSITY
Our ambition is for children to explore, to ask questions and to play by following their natural curiosity.
TOGETHERNESS
We aim to work in partnership with parents, carers, and professionals to ensure all children develop and progress.
NURTURE
Our ambition is to create a safe, secure, and caring setting with sensory rich experiences for children to develop social, emotional, and behavioural skills.
Implementation
The Avenues’ curriculum is structured in a progressive way. The implementation of our curriculum is in response to our intended mission statement as identified by our school values.
Through careful planning and delivery, our curriculum is differentiated and personalised to meet the needs of our learners, enabling them to reach their potential and celebrate their successes. We believe our pupils deserve the best provision possible and therefore we have high expectations and regularly review and evaluate the curriculum to ensure it is fit for purpose.
We strongly believe that our provision:
- Is broad and balanced with the flexibility to meet individual needs.
- Reflects progression and is differentiated to support the range of learners that we have.
- Promotes spiritual, moral, social, cultural, and physical development.
- Promotes creativity in learning.
- Engages parents in partnerships that will enhance the pupil’s cognitive, emotional, and social development.
- Operates within a clear framework of planning, assessment, and reporting.
Our offer is underpinned by a personalised approach to meet the needs of our pupils. We provide a specialised curriculum which utilises a range of teaching methods, additional specialist services, interventions, therapies, approaches, and strategies to promote and encourage good progress and access to the curriculum.
At our Year 2 provision, pupils are taught through a cross-curricular thematic curriculum. Maths, R.E. and areas of PSHEE stand alone to ensure sufficient coverage over the school year. Our curriculum is based on the key objectives from the National Curriculum programme of study and each theme is designed to include the interests of the pupils. The learning is planned through a theme, which means that it is more meaningful to our pupils and allows many opportunities to develop language skills and communication.
The curriculum is taught through half termly topics where the skills and knowledge of the National Curriculum are delivered at a level that meets the stages our pupils are at. We have used the Key Stage 1 curriculum for all subjects. The skills taught are progressive, and the summative assessment at the end of the topic is against the unit’s learning objectives – this is a best fit approach evaluating the degree of depth a child has learned the intended objectives.
At the start of each topic, we have a ‘launch event’ which immerses the children in the theme and provides opportunities to find out what children know. During the topic we encourage parents to get involved and invite them to participate in their child’s learning or share their knowledge at home. At the end of the topic, we have a ‘celebration event’ which showcases the knowledge and skills the children have learned throughout the term.
The teaching of reading and phonics is done primarily through the delivery of the Read Write Inc. Programme. Reading skills are then further developed across all areas of the curriculum. Book bands are used to provide graded books for home.
Impact
There is a clear assessment cycle within the provision and progress is measured using formative and summative approaches. We have identified a clear progress pathway for all our pupils despite their starting point or barriers they may have. This pathway is ambitious in its trajectory. The assessments listed below inform planning and targets for personalised learning for each pupil.
- Unit Learning Objectives
- PECs
- EHCP targets
- Read Write Inc
- SULP
- Occupational Therapy
