Intent
The DT curriculum at Abbey Hey provides children with relevant, coherent and progressive knowledge of the design process.
The design and technology curriculum is sectioned into three areas;
How have materials and components been used? How has the product been made? Why has it been made this way? What are the different parts of a product called and what does each do? How does the way a product works relate to its intended purpose?
How can materials, structures and techniques be tested? How can materials and structures be joined? Where might materials and structures fail?
How will ideas be explored, developed, communicated and modelled in a variety of ways? How will a product be made; what materials, equipment and processes will be used? What alternatives are there, if initial attempts fail? How well did the product work? What were the strengths and areas for development? How well did the final product relate to its intended purpose?
Our curriculum is designed to embed core disciplinary knowledge, and the ability to approach challenging, design questions
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Marking out and cutting skills
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Fixing and joining skills
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Mechanical and control skills
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Finishing skills, including food hygiene
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Related language skills
Implementation
Design and technology at Abbey Hey Academy is taught, generally, in alternate half-terms and is cross curricular. In EYFS design and technology is taught through the EYFS framework through focused modelling and daily provision activities.
Teachers are provided with an additional three planning days per year on top of their PPA, to plan their curriculum. As part of this planning process, teachers need to plan the following:
- All lessons at are planned around Rosenshine’s Ten Principals of Instruction framework and we believe that this alongside of Kagan structures promotes cooperative learning as well as enquiry.
- Lessons are recorded in indivdual scrapbooks, which move up with them to disply the progression of skills they have learnt across Abbey Hey.
- Our design and technology books should show the build-up of knowledge and skills needed to create a purposeful product.
- Trips and visiting experts who will enhance the learning experience.
- A means to display and celebrate the pupils’ design and technology work in their class.
Impact
Our Design and Technology Curriculum is high quality, well thought out and is planned to demonstrate progression year on year, giving pupils the skills and knowledge and vocabulary that they need to move forward in their learning, alongside opportunities to apply their knowledge to different situations. If children are keeping up with the curriculum, they are deemed to be making good or better progress. In addition, we measure the impact of our curriculum through the following methods:
- Pupil discussions about their learning; which includes discussion of their thoughts, ideas, processing and evaluations of work.
- A reflection on standards achieved against the planned outcomes;
- Each year group will have the opportunity to share and discuss their new product with a different year group.