Curriculum

Ladygrove Primary School – Curriculum Intent

Mission Statement

Our school mission statement,

‘Every day counts, every minute matters,’ is the heartbeat of our school and simply means education makes the difference to opportunities in life.

School Vision

At Ladygrove Primary School, we use a bespoke tailor-made Curriculum to guide our teaching and learning. We want children to be intrinsically motivated to learn and develop the skills needed to be lifelong learners.

Our Curriculum is designed to meet the needs of the National Curriculum, but most importantly tailored for the needs of our pupils and the context of our school. We promote resilience as one of our core school values and celebrate making mistakes as an important tool for learning.

Underpinned by British values, we need to prepare every child for an ever-changing society and our curriculum is founded on supporting our pupils to understand the difference between right and wrong, to be free to express views or ideas, as well as respect and tolerate the opinions or behaviour of others. We want our pupils to understand they are part of a system where everyone plays an equal part. As a result, our school rules are known as the SMART code:

S – Speak politely and listen carefully

M – Make school enjoyable for everyone

A – Act safely and sensibly

R – Respect each other and the environment

T – Try your best at all times

Our curriculum provides opportunities to promote positive attitudes to learning which reflect the values and skills needed to promote responsibility for learning and future success.

Every child is seen as a unique individual and their talents, ranging from Sports to the Arts are given equal recognition. We celebrate and welcome differences within our school community. Pupils are encouraged to explore beliefs, experience and faiths, feelings and values; enjoy learning about oneself, others and the surrounding world; use imagination and creativity and reflect on experiences.

School Values

We have developed our own learning animals, bespoke to our school. These animals are key symbols of teaching and learning and we celebrate these values on a weekly basis with Learner of the week awards.

Team Ant: how to work as a team (collaboration, reciprocity, empathy, developing listening skills)

Wise Owl: how to work independently (planning, reflecting, revising and editing)

Tough Tortoise: how to build resilience (persevere with learning, manage distractions)

Resourceful Squirrel: how to be resourceful (use prior leaning, make links, utilise resources to help with the learning)

Our termly values are as follows and these are printed in our new hall as a reminder to use all:

Autumn 1: Respectful

Autumn 2: Tolerant

Spring 1: Kindness

Spring 2: Persevere

Summer 1: Empathy

Summer 2: Independent

MARGE

Linked with the Learning animals, we use MARGE – an acronym based on a whole-brain learning approach for student and teachers by Professor Arthur Shimamura. MARGE filters through teaching and learning as Motivate Attend Relate Generate Evaluate.

MARGE Whole Brain Learning Guidance

Charity work

Charity involvement is an essential part of our curriculum where we believe our pupils develop and gain empathy. Every year, our pupils and families help raise money for national and local causes. We take part in Number day for the NSPCC, Roald Dahl Day for Roald Dahl’s Marvellous Children’s charity, Comic relief, Sports Relief, Children in Need, Christmas jumper day for Save the children and many more.

Pride in our school and our local area.

Our curriculum encourages children to develop a sense of pride in their local area and a sense of belonging, as well as having an appreciation of their local heritage and their place in the wider world.

Children leave Ladygrove with a sense of belonging to a tightly knit family where they have the confidence and skills to make decisions, self-evaluate, make connections and become successful lifelong learners.

Curriculum Maps

LONG TERM PLANS

Looking for learning

Each lesson begins with our Ladygrove Looking For Learning slide to support the children to talk about the purpose of their learning, how to apply it and what links they can make.