LHPS Design and Technology Curriculum Design

Guiding Principles

We want our children to Appreciate, Aspire and Achieve. We are committed to delivering a Design and Technology curriculum which develops the creative, technical and practical expertise needed to perform everyday tasks confidently and to participate successfully in an increasingly technological world.  Through the evaluation of past and present design and technology, we want our children to develop a critical understanding of its impact on daily life and the wider world.

Core Beliefs

Appreciate

Aspire

Achieve

A Design and Technology curriculum that develops every child’s ability to appreciate, care, respect and understand themselves, others and the world in which they live. A curriculum that also ensures that every child feels valued and cared for.

A Design and Technology curriculum that provides a range of opportunities, designed to empower every child to ‘dream big’ and develop a sense of what is possible for them to achieve now and in their future lives.

A Design and Technology curriculum that ensures all children have the skills, knowledge, attitude and social understanding to achieve in all aspects of their lives and equip them to become active and engaged citizens.

Curriculum Approach

Our mastery approach to lesson design is based upon our strong knowledge of pedagogy and our understanding of our children’s needs. This ensures that each lesson maximises both learning and our core beliefs of Appreciate, Aspire and Achieve.

Design and Technology is taught in all years groups through at least one unit of work each term, which includes one unit relating to food. It is taught in discrete lessons to ensure understanding in that area and to develop a love of that subject.

Where appropriate, connections between subjects are made in deepening this understanding. Projects are often connected to other subjects.

Design and Technology is largely taught in mixed ability groups, enabling all children to benefit from collaborative as well as independent learning. Using this approach, all children have the opportunity to combine practical skills with an understanding of aesthetic, social and environmental issues, as well as functions and industry.

Children design and make products that solve real and relevant problems within a variety of contexts. They learn to take risks, be reflective, be imaginative and curious, innovative, enterprising and resilient. Children are actively involved in designing, making and evaluating their products in every planned unit of work.

Teachers reinforce an expectation that all children can achieve at high standards in Design and Technology. All staff and children adopt a reflective approach to each lesson and evaluate learning and to plan next steps.

Effective questioning is a crucial component in Design and Technology lessons. Key questions are planned to encourage children to think about their learning, to reflect upon previous learning and to make connections between new and existing knowledge, using subject specific vocabulary.

Differentiation is achieved through adult support, peer-tutoring, personal challenge, and encouraging children’s individual flair and fluency. Staff take time to understand what motivates their children’s learning and the essential learning behaviours to help their children achieve.

A carefully considered approach to teaching and learning in Design and Technology is followed throughout the school, through the delivery of the two strands of Design and Technology: Designing & Making and Cooking & Nutrition.

In the Foundation Stage, children will explore Design and Technology by using a variety of media and materials through a combination of child initiated and adult directed activities.

In Designing & Making, children in Key Stage 1 are taught the knowledge, understanding and skills needed to engage in an iterative process of designing and making, through a variety of creative and practical activities. In Key Stage 2, in a range of relevant contexts, children are taught the knowledge, understanding and skills needed to engage in an iterative process of designing and making, through a variety of creative and practical activities.

Learning to cook is a crucial life skill and a love of cooking opens a door to one of the greatest expressions of human creativity. In Cooking & Nutrition across all year groups, all children are taught to prepare, cook and apply the principles of nutrition and healthy eating.

We provide high quality professional development to ensure that we are always improving the quality of our teaching so that this impacts upon children’s learning. All our teachers continually develop their subject knowledge of how to teach Design Technology. They engage in collaborative planning and are continually seeking to improve their effectiveness through the help and support of the subject leader.

Impact

Children’s knowledge, understanding and progress across all subject areas as well as their desire and ability to learn will be measured using a range of qualitative and quantitative strategies including: information from book scrutiny, lesson observations, drop ins, all stakeholder voice, collaborative research, use of external critical friends, and self / peer evaluation.

By the time a child leaves Lunt’s Heath Primary School in Year 6, they will have developed the creative, technical and practical expertise needed to perform everyday tasks confidently and to participate successfully in an increasingly technological world. They will have built a repertoire of knowledge in designing, making, and evaluating and be able to apply this to future learning.