Taught Curriculum

Curriculum Intent

At Chepping View Primary Academy, our curriculum has been designed to allow all pupils to transition to the next stage of their academic journey with the knowledge, skills, understanding, confidence and ambition required to succeed in modern Britain. The curriculum has been completely re-designed and updated from September 2022 and full details will be provided here as soon as possible.

Principles

Our academy motto ‘Everybody matters at Chepping View’ underpins our curriculum and teaching. Our curriculum is inclusive of all pupils and is adapted to ensure that they all meet their aspirational and challenging targets;
Throughout the curriculum, pupils are taught and given opportunities to develop the ‘Characteristics of Excellent Learners’ (CEL). These characteristics are known as the 5rs: resilience, resourcefulness, reflectiveness, relationships and risk-taking. This is further embedded through a CEL day each academic year;
Core British Values and the spiritual, moral, social and cultural development of our pupils, and their understanding of the values of our society, are woven through our curriculum. This ensures that pupils understand their rights and responsibilities, as well as the roles of law and democracy so they can flourish and succeed in an ever-changing world;
We have used the National Curriculum 2014 as the basis for our curriculum, ensuring that pupils have access to a curriculum that is similar in breadth and ambition. However, as an academy, we have taken autonomy over our curriculum and where appropriate have made meaningful links to our local environment and history so that pupils appreciate and respect the community in which they live;
At Chepping View, we believe that knowledge and skills should be taught side by side, so that one is not given priority over another and the pupils build knowledge, skills and cultural capital required for a successful life. Although taught through discrete subjects, where relevant, cross-curricular links are made so that pupils can see the connections in learning they are creating;
Themed weeks or days are used to engage, motivate and inspire pupils. They also allow teachers to go into more detail in a subject, increasing the pupils’ depth of understanding;
Our curriculum has been designed so that knowledge and skills acquired by the pupils are built progressively and in such a way that they can be retained, reinforced and developed;
The areas of phonics, oracy, early reading and reading are given a high priority at the academy and opportunities to develop these skills in all subjects are utilised as often as possible, preparing our pupils for the next stage of their education and helping them to overcome barriers to learning that result from having English as an additional language;
Outdoor, hands-on and real-life learning opportunities are developed wherever possible. This can be achieved through trips, working within the school grounds, forest school, visitors to the academy and linking the pupils’ learning to the world in which they live.

Core Subjects

We make use of our Academy freedoms to adapt the Chepping View curriculum to meet the needs of our pupils. We follow the new National Curriculum in Maths in all year groups. In English, we have adapted our curriculum to take account of most of the changes from the new National Curriculum, and in Science, we follow the new curriculum in all year groups. However, some Science units have been moved to an alternative year group to ensure there is enough time for good quality coverage. If you would like to find out more about the curriculum of any year group, please contact the year group or phase leader via the office- office@cvpa.school

To understand how we teach calculations in Maths please see our calculations policy here: Calculations Policy

Phonics

Phonics is taught daily from Foundation Stage to the end of Year 2 in classes using the Essential Letters and Sounds DfE Validated scheme. Children are entered for the National Phonics test at the end of Year 1. Those who do not meet the expected level are re-entered at the end of Year 2.

Phonics continues to be taught through Year 3 for those children who need additional input using the ELS materials and interventions. The rest of the children move on to age-appropriate spelling.

For more information on Phonics, visit our Phonics page.

Reading

Children are taught reading skills through phonics and other approaches mentioned above. Children who continue to need Phonics input in Y3 and 4 are provided it. They take part in weekly whole class guided reading sessions in Reception and KS1 and daily reading sessions in KS2. These sessions are focused on vocabulary, inference and comprehension skills.

Children are also given decodable reading books matched to their phonics teaching, as required by the ELS Phonics scheme until they have completed it. They also receive 'bonus books' which are for reading with an adult. These are mostly from the Oxford Reading Tree scheme, but include other schemes such as Cambridge PM and Big Cat.

Religious Education

We broadly follow the Buckinghamshire RE syllabus, with some adaptations to meet the needs of our school community.

Relationships and Health Education

We teach the statutory curriculum as part of PSHE, which we call 'Learning for Life'. For more details on this curriculum, visit the Relationships and Health page.

Cross-Curricular Work

The Chepping View curriculum makes links between topics to enhance learning and to provide a broad and balanced curriculum that follows clearly sequenced steps. This allows children to make connections without losing the integrity of the individual subjects.

Assessment

All schools now have the freedom to assess in a manner of their own choosing. At Chepping View, we use Insight to track children's progress.

We have a strong focus on Teacher Assessment, with teachers identifying where children are progressing well, and where the gaps in learning are. We use language like below expected level, at expected level and securing expected level. Day to day assessment informs future teaching.

Statutory Assessment

Reception- We assess children on entry using the Statutory Reception Baseline Assessment, and then regularly through the year. Children are judged to have met or be working towards the Early Learning Goals at the end of the year.

Year 1- Year 1 pupils do the Phonics Check in June with results given to parents in the end of year reports.

Year 2- Year 2 pupils take the Phonics Re-check if they did not meet the expected level in Y1.

Year 4- Year 4 pupils complete a statutory multiplication tables test.

Year 6- Year 6 pupils do a statutory Mental Arithmetic test, Maths test, Spelling, Punctuation and Grammar test and Reading Comprehension test in May. In some years, they may do a Science test, if the academy is selected to do so. These results are reported to parents, along with the Teacher Assessment of writing, in the end of year report.