Our Lady of Grace Catholic Infant School

The All Saints' Trust

 

Intent:

In everything we do at Our Lady of Grace Catholic Infant School, our children are at the centre as we follow our Mission Statement “We are Learning to grow and love like Jesus".  Through providing a rich, broad and balanced curriculum which underpins our faith, we strive to develop the skills, knowledge and learning attitudes of our children so that they may become the best they can be.  At the heart of our Religious Education and the curriculum is the wellbeing of our children to ensure they develop a growth mindset.  At Our Lady of Grace, there is a holistic approach to the development of the child which begins with focusing on wellbeing.  This then allows for a strong emphasis on the development of the core skills so they develop a love of learning and are able to apply these skills across the whole curriculum living out our school mission statement.

Our Catholic values help children to develop their social and moral code, as they build their sense of uniqueness and self-worth as an individual. We also recognise that parents are the primary educators of the faith and we work closely with the local parish and community in embedding these strong links with our parish and our local community we foster an ethos of serving both individuals and society. 

Our curriculum aims to:

  • Promote a positive attitude to learning within a secure and stimulating environment that promotes independence, self-esteem and health and well-being
  • Enable pupils to develop knowledge, understand concepts and acquire skills and be able to choose and apply these in relevant situations, providing enrichment opportunities
  • Support learners to use prior knowledge, conceptual understanding to deepen their knowledge and understanding and make links in their learning
  • Support pupil’s social, moral, spiritual and cultural development to enable them to become global citizens of the 21st Century, embracing all that multi-cultural Britain has to offer them   
  • Enrich vocabulary and comprehension of subject-specific language to enable them to articulate their learning that builds on their home experiences and backgrounds
  • Promote a positive attitude to learning within a secure and stimulating environment that promotes independence, self-esteem and health and well-being
  • Ensure progression across year groups and phases with high expectations for all groups of pupils and appropriate levels of challenge and support 

Implementation:

The Catholic ethos of our school and British Values underpins our curriculum and supports children to develop personal skills, and ways of thinking, feeling and acting to become global citizens with a strong moral and cultural identity.  The focus on wellbeing via weekly sessions, access to our on site wellbeing adviser and art therapist promotes a positive self-image as a learner.

The successful delivery of curriculum intent is dependent upon quality first teaching, matched to a coherently planned curriculum model.  We teach subjects discretely through over-arching themes which reinforce children's learning and allows children to make connections.

When planning a curriculum, Our Lady of Grace Catholic Infant School has had to recognise the very wide social and economic backgrounds of our families.  We recognise R.E as a core subject, so we adhere to a diocesan-wide curriculum and follow ‘Dr. Margaret Carswell’s RE Framework’, as well as the National Curriculum. 

Our learning experiences take full advantage of our local area and build on children’s home experiences and interests and real questions they want to ask, as well as supporting families to access facilities that support learning 

 Learning is encouraged through an engaging first-hand experience .This approach supports children who are at different starting points from which children can develop their learning, building on what they can already do, their existing knowledge and interests. 

We ensure that children who need additional support to access the curriculum such as SEND, or are disadvantaged or vulnerable, are exceptionally well supported with provision and time and their progress is rigorously monitored. Learning  is accurately matched and appropriately pitched so that they achieve increasing confidence and independence across the curriculum.  

The structure of our school timetable provides clarity for all staff and children. In Key Stage 1 there is sufficient flexibility to allow English and Mathematics to be taught at any time in the school day and other subjects are organised in blocks over the term to provide greater continuity in skills, knowledge and depth. Our disadvantaged pupils make good progress from their starting points, and this is a continuing focus for us and particularly our subject leaders. We have a specialist music teacher who delivers recorder and glockenspeil tuition as well as singing throughout the school.

Classroom environments are appropriate, stimulating and purposeful and include opportunities for indoor and outdoor learning

Teachers provide children with opportunities to express their ideas, using the language of thinking and learning, using possibility questions like “I remember when…” “I tried this but…” “We found out that…” “We solved the problem by…” “We know…” “I can…” “We thought…” successfully avoiding answers like “I don’t know.”

Opportunities are provided for children to reflect on their experiences and talk about their learning, accepting constructive criticism and suggestions from children and adults

We use a range of strategies to promote high expectations, combine transferable skills, demonstrate a breadth of vocabulary and develop strong cross-curricular links. These include knowledge organisers and a treasure chest of key subject specific vocabulary.

Children are able to talk positively about their learning behaviours through the language of our learning behaviour mascots.

Families play an important role in their children’s learning and work in partnership to support and review current themes and upcoming learning through knowledge organisers, home learning challenges and end of theme celebrations. Home learning is shared through Google Classrooms and allows for daily dialogue between teachers and families, as needed. 

Being able to read is the most important skill a student will learn. Reading has far-reaching implications for lifelong confidence and wellbeing. We are aware that learning to read is challenging for some of our children. 

Read, Write Inc. is a synthetic phonic program that provides a systematic approach to teaching reading, writing and spelling. Read, Write Inc. is fully compatible with the broad and rich curriculum available at Our Lady of Grace Catholic Infant School. 

Read, Write Inc. gives us: 

  • Systematic, structured teaching using simultaneous visual, auditory and kinaesthetic processes Clear importance of speaking and listening
  • Encouragement of collaborative working
  • A clear role for parents/carers

The pleasure and comprehension aspect of reading is taught through the Echo Reading approach.

Subject leaders play an important part in the success of the curriculum by leading a regular programme of monitoring, evaluation and review. This includes book scrutinies, learning walks and lesson observations to measure the impact of teaching and learning. The Senior Leaders use data from all areas to make comparisons across groups and within groups, as well as keeping track of children’s progress and attainment from point to point to ensure they are keeping on track. We also use children interviews and surveys to gauge children’s engagement and enjoyment of the curriculum as well as monitoring  to inform future planning and improve teaching and learning. Teachers and leaders also have the school’s curriculum assessment data to support judgements on the impact our curriculum is having.

The leadership team in consultation with staff and children regularly review and renew the school curriculum to ensure all elements are fit for purpose. Subject Leads report back regularly to Senior Leaders to ensure standards and school development remains sharply focused

As a school we invest in the training of all staff such as the implementation of  termly whole school Read Write Inc development days and subject development .

 Impact:

Teachers continually use assessment of the children’s responses and the learning they produce to measure impact. The outcomes of the curriculum are measured by the attainment and progress made by the children. Put simply: how much the children know and remember including whether or not they know more. 

There are also wider curriculum outcomes as children are proud to be a member of Our Lady of Grace Catholic Infant School. They display an excellent work ethic and fully share our school mission and actively live it out.

We believe that the impact of our curriculum and the quality of education provided by the leadership and staff of Our Lady of Grace  ensures that our children leave the school as exceptionally well-rounded, confident children who are polite and resilient recognising the importance of team work, never giving up, always having a go as well as being independent learners.

Our expectations for our children is limitless. Our core purpose is to ensure all children achieve the highest standards in all aspects of the curriculum, leaving this school prepared for the next stage in their education as well as being global citizens of today.

For further information, please contact our Deputy Headteacher, Patricia Geraghty: 020 8450 6757 or by email to: admin@ologinfants.brent.sch.uk

Home Learning - Google Classroom Digital Platform

Google Classroom is the digital platform that facilitates communication between home and school to consolidate learning and to ensure continued communication, via messagning and posting assignments, so that parents, children and staff actively interact to consolidate learning provigind an effective home school partnership.  Google classroom and the use of different online applications across the School provides an opportunity to personalise the learning to meet the needs of the children by the use of reading rooms. Home learning is provided weekly to reinforce learning that has taken place during that week providing children with an opportunity to consolidate as well as apply their learning in a different context.