Curriculum Rationale

We seek to offer all KS3 students a broad and balanced, knowledge rich curriculum through which joy, awe and exploration can be experienced in the drive for excellence and that:

• promotes their spiritual, moral, cultural, mental and physical development

• prepares them for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of later life

• seeks to provide them with an introduction to the essential knowledge that they need to be educated citizens

• introduces them to the best that has been thought and said; and

• engenders an appreciation of human creativity and achievement.

The curriculum provides an outline of core knowledge and skills around which teachers seek to develop exciting and stimulating lessons to promote the development of students’ knowledge, understanding and skills. The following principles guide what we wish to achieve through our curriculum.

Principles
• Is sufficiently broad to reflect local need and address the needs of our students
• Ensures all students have equal access, clarifying what each learner is entitled to
• Is sufficiently broad to allow for personalisation where it supports specific learning needs
• Is collaborative and considers input from subject leads
• Stimulates, engages and challenges all students

Knowledge
• Has at its core carefully structured knowledge acquisition
• Facilitates progression where students encounter ever greater depth of understanding and challenge, aspiring to mastery
• Revisits key elements of knowledge to support progression in learning
• Is both layered and sequential to support progress towards greater depth of understanding
• Encourages the acquisition of subject specific vocabulary and knowledge in a corporate manner
• Is organised in a way that best supports progression
• addresses the content of the national curriculum where appropriate

Skills
• Allows for skills to be valued, practised and applied, underpinned by knowledge
• Encourages resilience and a growth mind-set
Assessment
Aims to address perceived gaps in specific cohort learning such as disadvantaged and Send students
• Is assessed both diagnostically and summatively to address gaps in knowledge and to provide meaningful feedback to learners, teachers and parents alike
• Is reviewed regularly in the context of outcomes, local and national developments
• Is sufficiently flexible to address unforeseen learners' needs

The taught curriculum is just one element in the education of each student and we consciously allow time and space in and beyond the school day to go beyond the programmes of study for each subject and to strive for excellence. The opportunity to develop character and values in our young people is at the core of what we do. We aspire for our youngsters to become global citizens with a conscience. Our House system is key in providing opportunities to encourage students to take ever more responsibility for their own learning and behaviour and we offer opportunities to demonstrate and practise character building so that our students may become:
• Articulate
• Confident
• Positive and responsible
• Solution-focused and organised
• Flexible, resilient and grounded
• Problem solvers
• Able to handle conflict
• Original and creative
• Honest and resourceful
• Able to put others at ease
• Active listeners
• Creative and innovative
• Kind
• Respectful and tolerant
• Leaders

What we teach & why

In Key Stage 3 (KS3 or years 7, 8 and 9), we offer a range of National Curriculum subjects to fulfil the requirements of our Curriculum Rationale and to give all students a good grounding in all subjects before starting GCSEs in Y10. This is when students choose 4 optional GCSE level subjects (Options) to complement compulsory English, Maths, Science, PSHE and PE in Years 10 and 11. 

Curriculum Structure

Options in Years 10 & 11

Curriculum Team information

For subject specific details, please see the documents below: