St Mary's Curriculum Overview
Our curriculum is based on the Curriculum for Wales. The four purposes are the shared vision and aspiration for every child and young person. In fulfilling these, we set high expectations for all, promote individual and national well-being, tackle ignorance and misinformation, and encourage critical and civic engagement.
Find out more about the new curriculum in the document below.
A guide to the Curriculum for Wales (Welsh Government document)
Curriculum Vision
We provide a broad, balanced curriculum where all children can develop independence and skills for life. We work with individual children to ensure that they achieve their potential and cater for all children’s unique characters, talents, needs and interests to help children make sense of the world around them; to help them appreciate it and to question it, to thrive in it and to shape it.
We recognise each child as uniquely talented and made in the image of Christ. Children at St Mary’s are nurtured and supported to fulfil their potential in a loving and caring environment, developing the knowledge and skills needed to prosper in their world and to be life-long learners.
At St Mary’s, we…
Know each child as an individual.
Nurture each child.
Provide meaningful opportunities for growth in a coherent way so that successes are built on and celebrated.
The Development of our Curriculum
Our curriculum has been developed over years and through many staff meetings, INSET Days and training sessions. Teachers have worked together to plan a coherent curriculum following consultation with all stakeholders - the children, their parents and our governors.
The curriculum is regularly updated and tweaked to suit the needs of the cohorts of children at St Mary's.
Before evening thinking about designing the curriculum, school staff discussed the purpose of the primary curriculum in a Catholic school in Wales. We were guided by the four purposes of the Curriculum for Wales and by the aims of Catholic schools and we thought carefully about what we think the children of Flint and the surrounding areas need to learn.
Catholic education endeavours to make the person of Jesus Christ known and loved, and to place Him and the teachings of the Catholic Church at the centre of the educational enterprise.
Catholic Education Service, 2014
In 2021, we gave our children questionnaires to find out what they thought should be in our curriculum. There were four questions:
1. Write three words to describe what a really successful St Mary's pupil would be like when they leave Year 6.
2. What do you think it is important to have learnt to do before you leave St Mary's in Year 6?
3. What world issues do you think you should have the opportunity to find out more about while you are at St Mary's?
4. What local issues do you think you should have the opportunity to find out more about while you are at St Mary's?
Here are the results:
1. Successful St Mary's pupils:
2. What do you think you should have learnt to do before you leave St Mary's?
3. World Issues to learn about:
4. Local issues to learn about:
Our Values and Behaviours
Through our curriculum, we aim to nurture children spiritually, morally and emotionally. By developing aspects of the St Mary’s Pupil Profile, which is in line with the Jesuit pupil profile, we instil Gospel values in our children.
St Mary’s children are:
Grateful for their own gifts, for the gift of other people, and for the blessings of each day; and generous with their gifts, becoming boys and girls for others.
Attentive to their experience and to their vocation; and discerning about the choices they make and the effects of those choices.
Compassionate towards others, near and far, especially the less fortunate; and loving by their just actions and forgiving words.
Faith-filled in their beliefs and hopeful for the future.
Eloquent and truthful in what they say of themselves, the relations between people, and the world.
Learned, finding God in all things; and wise in the ways they use their learning for the common good.
Curious about everything; and active in their engagement with the world, changing what they can for the better.
Intentional in the way they live and use the resources of the earth, guided by conscience; and prophetic in the example they set to others.
The Curriculum for Wales
The Curriculum for Wales has four main purposes and encourages children to become;
- Ambitious, capable learners
- Healthy, confident individuals
- Enterprising, creative contributors
- Ethical, informed citizens
The four purposes of the Curriculum for Wales dovetails with our purpose as a Catholic school. By keeping Jesus and His teachings at the forefront of our thinking, all curriculum teaching will be based on Catholic values and the four purposes.
The principles of a holistic education, teaching children and young people about the world and equipping them with the life-long skills to be flexible, adaptable, resilient, and with the character strengths necessary for full human flourishing (and so fulfilling their gifts and potential), are aims shared by a Catholic vision for education and formation.
Mandatory Elements
Throughout the curriculum, the three mandatory cross-curricular elements of literacy, numeracy and digital competence will be incorporated into topic work.
Effective pedagogy is paramount to supporting progression. The 12 pedagogical principles will be selected by teachers to support progression and will be adapted to suit our learners’ needs.
Integral Skills
By designing our curriculum in a thoughtful, coherent way, we aim to help children develop the integral skills of
- Creativity and innovation
- Critical thinking and problem-solving
- Personal effectiveness
- And the ability to plan and organise.
Children will be given opportunities to develop these skills in a wide range of contexts in all classes at an age-appropriate level.
Relationships and Sexuality Education
We follow Curriculum for Wales guidance for the provision of our relationship and sex education sessions and we use the ‘Life To The Full’ RSE programme from Nursery to Year 6. This programme focuses on physical, social, emotional, intellectual and spiritual development and has, as its foundational premise, the belief that we are made in the image and likeness of God. More information about this can be found on the designated Relationships and Sexuality Education page on our website.
Curriculum Model
Our vision for the curriculum is of multi-disciplinary cross-curricular units with a strong foundation in basic literacy, numeracy and digital competence skills. Our St Mary’s Curriculum is built around ‘big questions’ which allow children to direct aspects of their own learning within a coherent overall structure.
Children are given meaningful and relevant authentic learning experiences with the aim of exciting and engaging them so that they can become independent, self-motivated learners.
The curriculum is coherent with clear progression through themes that build on children’s prior knowledge and understanding. Children will know how what they are learning fits into a bigger picture. Skills and concepts contained within the 27 Statements of What Matters in the AOLEs are developed over our pupils' time at school. When we revisit we will extend and deepen these skills and concepts to ensure progression in learning appropriate to our learners' developmental stages.
The curriculum is challenging and regular low-stakes assessment is built into the curriculum to inform future planning and to allow teachers to adapt teaching to support individual learners.
Children should retain and apply knowledge and skills and use these in new situations across AOLEs.
Opportunities are given to enrich pupils' learning in a variety of ways. These may include inviting visitors to school, children going on school day trips and residential trips, collaborating with cluster schools and lots of opportunities will be given for the children to learn outside the classroom in our forest school area and elsewhere in our school grounds.
The following subjects are taught in a disciplinary style i.e. they will not be taught as part of topic work:
Phonics
Maths
RVE
Religion, Values and Ethics in our school has been designed in accordance with the school’s trust deeds and has regard to the Agreed Syllabus. For RVE lessons, we will continue to use the Religious Education Directory as our framework and this will be developed through introducing creative approaches. More details about our RVE teaching is available here.
Progression and Assessment
The three main roles played by assessment in supporting our learners’ progression are:
- Supporting individual learners on an ongoing, day-to-day basis
- Identifying, capturing and reflecting on individual learner progress over time
- Understanding group progress in order to reflect on practice.
Teachers are constantly assessing childrens’ progress and understanding through careful questioning.
In addition to the daily feedback cycle, children will sit personalised assessments to gauge progress.