Rationale:
At the heart of our science curriculum is the desire to build a secure knowledge of the world around us. We do this by systematically building up the students’ schema of knowledge about natural phenomena and their investigation.
In doing so, we believe our students will be able to use a strong knowledge foundation to pursue an area of the world in which their curiosity may take them and have the tools to meaningfully make progress in this pursuit.
Curriculum design, first and foremost incorporates all elements of the science national curriculum. Topics have been carefully sequenced so that they build on one another at spaced intervals to enable greater retention. To enable a greater understanding of the topic, some lesson content moves beyond the national curriculum.
In KS2, the terms are roughly split into biology, chemistry and physics which begins to set pupils up for an understanding of those parts of science in secondary school. Practical investigation skills (How Science Works) are interwoven into the content and are often built into the climax of each topic to enable students to apply the knowledge they have just gained. This also means that the core structure of a science investigation is repeated and reinforced throughout the Key Stage.
Knowledge organisers are shared with pupils and children are supported to learn the key knowledge within them; this helps to develop pupils’ schema, transferring knowledge from their short-term to long-term memory. Schema is developed due to the knowledge in the knowledge organisers building on prior learning from previous topics, but also previous year groups.
Our approach to supporting pupils who may need help to access the curriculum is through pre-teaching to make sure that they have the knowledge and skills to succeed in accessing learning rather than having to continuously be catching up.
Assessment opportunities are carefully planned so that they are purposeful, support learning and inform us as to whether our curriculum and or the delivery of it is effective.
Science Curriculum Documents:
To view all Knowledge Organisers for all year groups click on the folder link below:
