Our Curriculum
At Kitchener, we believe that it is vital for all our children to have a voice and are all valued. Therefore, we have created a curriculum which embodies this vision alongside our five core values of Care, Equality, Community, Identity and Learning.
We seek to build a language and oracy-rich curriculum that embraces collaboration and cooperation; and a curriculum that reflects the diversity of our school community, building a sense of belonging for all.
The Curriculum at Kitchener Primary School is centred around providing all children with the knowledge, skills and experience to work meaningfully towards achieving the Four Core Purposes, therefore becoming Ambitious Capable Learners, Enterprising and Creative Contributors, Ethical and Informed Citizens and Healthy and Confident Individuals. The four purposes have been mapped through our curriculum vision (see Appendix A) to ensure they are at the centre of our curriculum design.
Our aim is to provide all children with engaging experiences which enable them to apply skills within the Cross Curricular Responsibilities of Literacy, Numeracy and the Digitally Competence Framework across the six Areas of Learning and Experiences (AoLE):
- Expressive Arts
- Health and Wellbeing
- Literacy, Language and Communication (LLC)
- Humanities
- Numeracy and Mathematics
- Science and Technology
Kitchener Primary School is relentless in its pursuit of providing all of our children with an exciting and engaging curriculum that is filled with high-quality learning experiences which are relevant and meaningful to the community, and the world we live in today.
Stakeholder engagement:
Our school curriculum vision was created in consultation with a range of stakeholders including teachers, support staff, governors, parents and carers, our pupils and the wider school cluster. The school held a programme of Professional Learning sessions with all staff and governors to consider a draft vision. Through meetings with the school council and online consultation with parents, a final draft was created. This was shared for feedback with the school community and governors. Our curriculum vision was launched in 2021 and underpins all areas of school life. Our curriculum enables us to realise our wider school vision.
As part of curriculum design:
- Our school leaders and teachers undertook reading and research and attended professional learning on curriculum.
- Our whole staff team agreed on key features of our school context, pupils and community to inform the approaches and experiences best suited to the needs of all learners at our school and consider the four purposes.
- Through online and in-person surveys, all governors, staff, parents and pupils were asked to consider what all pupils should know and be able to do, and which values they should develop during their time at the school. All staff worked together to identify the required changes to our current culture, provision and practices.
- Teachers have worked with Commitment to Cardiff and staff from the cluster schools to support one another in planning our curriculum, ensuring progression along the 3–16 continuum.
- All learners engage in discussions at the beginning and end of learning projects, giving learners a voice in what and how they learn.
- The school regularly shares information with parents/careers on the curriculum and ways they can support their child within and outside the school environment.
- The school collaborates and consults with a range of providers from the local and wider community on providing learners with distinct and enriching experiences, including those related to religion, values and ethics (RVE).
How the curriculum meets the required elements of the Curriculum for Wales, starting with the four purposes:
Our school curriculum is suitable for all learners, is centred on EAL pedagogy (see Appendix 2) and will enable them to realise the four purposes. It takes account of and responds to the unique opportunities and challenges that present themselves to individuals and groups of learners in our school, including those with ALN and those from Global Majority backgrounds.
It is an anti-racist and inclusive curriculum that supports Wales’s aim of being an anti-racist society by 2030. Our school curriculum is broad and balanced, fun and exciting, and includes active and authentic learning opportunities within and across all the Areas of Learning and Experience. It encompasses the concepts in all the statements of what matters and provides appropriate progression in accord with the principles of progression.
It also aligns to the mandatory requirements of teaching Welsh, English and Religion, Values and Ethics (RVE). The mandatory elements of Relationship and Sexuality Education (RSE) and the cross-curricular skills of literacy, numeracy and digital competence are embedded throughout the curriculum. Our RSE curriculum has been adapted to suit our community, and has been developed in partnership with our wider school cluster, the local authority and the Welsh Assembly in order to be sensitive to the religious values and ethics of all those who make up our school community.
Progression and Assessment:
We believe progression and assessment is fundamental to ensuring we achieve our school vision. Our school curriculum is underpinned by the mandatory principles of progression, which describe what it means for learners to progress and the capacities and behaviours our staff will seek to support, regardless of a learners’ stage of development.
Our assessment arrangements are informed by these principles of progression. We use a variety of evidence-informed assessment strategies to enable each individual learner to make progress at an appropriate pace. We ensure our processes identify learners who require further support or challenge and provide rich qualitative intelligence for us to inform next steps in learning for individuals and groups of learners.
Our assessment arrangements ensure active engagement between learners and teachers and is based on ongoing reflection on where a learner is, what their next steps are and what is required to support them in achieving these.
How the curriculum will be kept under review, including the process for feedback and ongoing revision:
Our school curriculum will be kept under review to ensure that it meets the needs of our learners and supports our school vision. Throughout the year there will be a variety of self-evaluation activities to inform our understanding of the effectiveness of our curriculum and the required revision. We will work within our school, across the cluster and in partnership with governors, the regional consortia and the local authority to further develop a shared understanding of progression and to ensure a high-quality 3-16 continuum of learning for all.
