Hungerford Primary School

Introduction

Hungerford Primary School is a two-form entry primary school located close to the centre of Hungerford, West Berkshire. There are currently 348 pupils on roll. The school itself is spread over a fairly large site with two of the fourteen classrooms in the old infant school building. Inside, at the centre of the school, is the library. There is also a hall used for assemblies and lunch as well as a number of shared spaces for small group work and interventions.  Surrounding the school are a large field, a forest school area and garden spaces as well as plenty of green spaces in the town itself which the school uses for field trips for science and geography. The school and town have a predominantly White British demographic with some Eastern European and Sri Lankan pupils attending the school.

Intent

At Hungerford Primary School, we want our curriculum to be one that inspires curiosity and promotes high aspirations. As well as this, we want it to instil a stronger sense of independence by challenging our pupils to think more deeply and be more creative. Our curriculum needs to have a clear pathway through each theme, year group and through the school as a whole, with engaging entry points, opportunities to build on previous learning and relevant, meaningful ways in which our pupils can show what they have learnt. Our Learning Means the World curriculum will allow us to introduce global issues to our pupils in an age-appropriate way, with cohesive cross-curricular links and with a focus on literacy. This curriculum for human flourishing will help our pupils to think about the world and the people in it both now and in the future.

At Hungerford Primary School, we recognise the importance of human creativity and achievement in learning and how this leads to the development of educated citizens.

Rationale for Implementation

We use Dimensions ‘Learning Means the World’ Curriculum as the main vehicle for achieving our outlined intent.

This curriculum is underpinned by four highly relevant world issues, known as the four Cs:-

Culture    Communication    Conflict    Conservation

Communication

At Hungerford Primary School, we recognise that communication and being able to communicate effectively is a key tool for the future. If we can set our pupils up with good communication skills in their early education, then they will know how to use them, improve them and be good communicators as adults. We have noticed that when some of our pupils join us in Reception, they have relatively low communication skills and it is important that we put things in place from day one to enable them to socialise, ask for help and talk clearly to adults and their peers alike. It is also important that we demonstrate a broad and varied vocabulary to all our pupils so that they know what language is appropriate in certain situations and how to express themselves clearly both in written and spoken forms.

In recent years, the school has done significant work on improving oracy across the school through the Voice 21 programme. From visiting a school using Voice 21, it was clear that the communication skills the pupils had learnt there meant that they were more engaged in their learning. They were having to actively listen and respond to both their teachers and their peers and everyone was encouraged to contribute in their lessons. This was something that we wanted to bring into Hungerford Primary School and we have seen a significant improvement in oracy and learning confidence in our classes. We strongly feel that as communication is a key world issue in the Learning Means the World curriculum, it will support and elevate the oracy learning that is already taking place.

Culture

We recognise that at Hungerford Primary School, and Hungerford in general, the demographic of our community is predominantly White British and some of our children do not have the opportunity to meet, socialise with or spend time with people from different cultures, backgrounds or ethnicities. We feel that through our Learning Means the World curriculum, we can allow our pupils to experience a greater diversity of cultures and traditions and help them to celebrate the wonderful similarities and differences between people from all backgrounds.

Alongside celebrating the culture of others, we also want to teach our pupils the importance of recognising their own culture and the importance of caring, protecting and valuing it. Our pupils attend school in an area that has significant historical and environmental importance with the Great Western Railway, the Kennet and Avon Canal and links to John of Gaunt and William of Orange. Its location on the routes to Bath and London made Hungerford a significant coaching town in the past too. We feel that, through our curriculum, we can help our pupils recognise the significance of where they live, how it has changed over the years and the cultural traditions that continue to this day.

Through culture, we also want to continue to build connections with local sports teams, museums and theatres to give our pupils vital enrichment opportunities.

Conflict

Within school, we aim for our curriculum to work alongside our practise of restorative justice when it comes to conflict. From the start of school, we work closely with our pupils to recognise how their actions can make other people feel, but also to be able to say how they feel as a result of someone else’s actions. They learn to build on that and then move forward to find a solution to any disagreement they have had. It is important that our pupils take responsibility for their part in the conflict and start to be able to restore their friendships without always needing an adult to intervene. At Hungerford, we feel it is important that our pupils encounter small problems and conflicts and know how to deal with them so that when bigger problems occur as they grow up, they have the necessary skills to tackle them too. We link our conflict resolution closely with our communication through the language of choice; ‘if you choose this action, the consequence will be…’.

By understanding smaller conflicts, we can then use our Learning Means the World curriculum to understand why people disagree and fight one another on a more global scale. By having an awareness of different cultures, religions and backgrounds, we can teach our pupils that these can be causes for conflict and it is from this that can we start to discuss ways to resolve conflict. If we can teach understanding, we can resolve problems.

Conservation

At Hungerford Primary School, we see conservation as being two-fold. Firstly, we want to teach our pupils, through our Learning Means the World curriculum, about the importance of caring for the environment and how their actions can have an impact both positively and negatively! We already have small schemes in place to improve our school and local environment such as litter picking and the planting of wildflowers in areas around the school to attract a wider variety of wildlife. We regularly take our pupils to areas such as the common and local woodlands to share with them the importance of nature and link it closely to our learning in the classroom. We will continue to do this alongside our Learning Means the World curriculum.

Secondly, we want to educate our pupils on the conservation of culture and values. As mentioned in culture, our pupils live and go to school in an area rich with local traditions and historical significance. Through our curriculum, we want them to think about why it is important that events, traditions, stories and aspects of human geography such as old buildings like our school are preserved, with the same prominence as physical geographical features and landscapes, for future generations.

Our curriculum narrative begins with Communication, as we feel it underpins the whole of our curriculum and good communication skills are vital for life in the wider world. It is important that our pupils learn to listen to one another and share ideas. If they can successfully communicate with one another and respect the views and opinions of others then they will develop into tolerant, culturally-minded individuals. This will then lead us succinctly into Culture by combining our strong communication ethos with our wider school values. Our school values are kindness, responsibility, curiosity, aspiration and community-mindedness and we feel that all five of these will support our children in understanding the significance of their own culture as well as that of others.

We will next follow culture with Conflict as we want our pupils to understand that poor communication skills and a lack of kindness, community-mindedness and understanding can lead to conflict but by being able to listen, share ideas, take responsibility and be kind to one another, we can prevent conflict from happening both within school and on a larger scale too.

Finally, we will finish our school year with Conservation as it is important to recognise that after conflict we can have peace which allows us to focus on resolution, conservation and restoration both socially, culturally and environmentally.

We also encourage our pupils to have high aspirations by teaching them about human creativity and achievement through additional Competency Units about famous figures and groups of people that focus on Creativity, Commitment, Courage and Community.

Curriculum Organisation

The classes are split into 4 groups based on Age.

Explorers- Foundation children. Click here to see the Yearly Overview

Pathfinders- Years 1 & 2. Click here to see the Yearly Overview

Adventurers- Years 3 & 4. Click here to see the Yearly Overview

Navigators- Years 5 & 6. Click here to see the Yearly Overview

We have recently updated the above policy which is now on our website. This policy sets out what will be taught in the summer term using our Dimensions 3D PSHE scheme of work. We attach a copy of the content overview which also outlines the vocabulary being taught for each year group.