CURRICULUM INTENT
The curriculum at St Matthew’s Primary School creates curious, self-motivated learners who are able to confidently engage with the world around them.
Through our curriculum all children develop self-confidence and positive relationships. We promote support and coping skills and ensure all learners experience and celebrate achievement and success.
Our pupils are our future community. Our curriculum takes all of our pupils on a journey which provides opportunities to develop skills and knowledge; both academic and personal, which will ensure that success is achievable for all, regardless of circumstance.
Our curriculum inspires learners to be aspirational and to be prepared for their next stage of their education; developing citizens of an ever changing world. Pupils are aware of their impact on the local and global environment in terms of health and wellbeing, in addition to their social and economic influence.
We discover and grow individual talents, broaden our learners’ horizons and raise aspirations through our everyday curriculum and memorable opportunities.
SUBJECT LEADERS
Subject leaders in our school are implementing the curriculum that we have mapped out for the whole school and is followed by all year groups. They will be continually collaborating with teachers to discuss the sequencing of lessons and ensuring a high quality curriculum is taught to all. We have pupil subject ambassadors. who have been selected for their flair, interest and enthusiasm for a subject. Their role is to work with the subject leaders to ensure the curriculum is fun, engaging and memorable.
ENGLISH
Mr M. Sowden
Miss M. Pake
HISTORY
Mrs F. Ahmed
Mrs R. Iqbal
MUSIC
Mrs A. Drew
PHYSICAL EDUCATION
Mr D. Chaplen
Mr T. Campbell
Mr R. Drew
COMPUTING
Mr A. Bumpus
MATHS
Miss L. Chapman
Miss N. Perera
Miss S. Walker (maternity leave)
GEOGRAPHY
Mrs L. Frampton-McCready
ART
Mrs S. Agha
SPANISH
Mr J. Kirkpatrick
Mrs E. Millett (maternity leave)
SCIENCE
Mrs L. Blunt
Mrs L. Plane
Mrs N. Koriya (maternity leave)
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION
Miss M. McBarron
DESIGN TECHNOLOGY
Miss A. Erahdun
Miss S. Khanom
PERSONAL, HEALTH & SOCIAL EDUCATION
Mrs R. Bardon
Miss J. Daniels
ART
Subject leader: Mrs S. Agha
We understand that art stimulates children’s innate desire to express themselves. We feel that art enables children of all abilities to communicate what they see, feel and think through the use of colour, texture, form, pattern and different materials and processes. Therefore we will encourage our children to explore ideas and meanings through researching a continual thread of artists and designers. We will support them to explore the impact of art on different times and cultures and we would also like them to appreciate artistic styles from around the world and discover how it can enrich lives.
COMPUTING
Subject leader: Mr A. Bumpus
In the ever changing technological world we live in, we need to provide the children with the knowledge and understanding of the role technology will play in all aspects of their lives. We will do this whilst ensuring children remain safe online and understand the possibility of how technology will impact on any future careers. It is our intention to enable children to find, explore, analyse, exchange and present information. We also focus on developing the skills necessary for children to be able to use information in an effective way.
DESIGN TECHNOLOGY
Subject leaders: Miss A. Erahdun / Miss S. Khanom
DT is taught through a purposeful and skills based curriculum with a focus on the development of practical and technical skills. The five key areas of DT (cooking and nutrition, textiles, construction, electronics and computer aided design) are underpinned by the design, make and evaluate cycle.
ENGLISH
Subject leaders: Mrs N. Kingston / Mr M. Sowden / Miss M. Pake / Mrs E. Matthews
English is taught throughout the school as a discrete subject and through wider cross-curricular topics and activities.
English Curriculum
Reading
READING INTENT
At St Matthew’s, we instil a passion for reading for all children. We believe that reading for enjoyment is a gateway to a world of opportunity. We combine high quality, vocabulary rich texts with the explicit teaching of reading skills including: decoding, fluency, retrieval and inference. Alongside this, we ensure children have exposure to a wide range of genres covering all aspects of purposeful reading in all curriculum areas. As well as reading in school, we encourage children to engage in wider reading through our 100 Book Challenge. We recognise reading is an essential life skill and children will leave St Matthew’s with a love of reading.
Writing
WRITING INTENT
At St Matthew’s, we provide exciting, engaging and purposeful opportunities to inspire all pupils and instil a passion for writing. We combine high quality, vocabulary rich texts with enthusiastic and engaging teaching practice to immerse children in a range of text types and genres. Alongside this, we ensure children have a solid understanding of the transcription and grammatical skills necessary to write fluently, accurately and effectively.
IMPLEMENTATION
We know that talk is fundamental to the writing process. At St Matthew’s, writing happens collaboratively: we use shared, paired and modelled writing to enable children to write independently. For each genre we follow a three-phase process with each phase containing a number of steps. Each phase typically lasts three to five lessons. Once per half term, children should be provided with an opportunity to publish a piece of work.
Phonics Policy
Currently being reviewed.
Reading Policy
Currently being reviewed.
Writing Policy
Currently being reviewed.
Reading Schemes
The teaching of early reading uses a phonics approach, using the following resources
- Bug Club Phonics
Bug Club Phonics is our chosen DfE-validated scheme for children to learn phonics systematically and rehearse their skills using Bug Club’s phonetically decodable reading books, real books, and online books. Once children have moved beyond phonics they rehearse their reading skills taught in school by selecting their own reading books from the appropriate Book Band level. - Children then move to the Accelerated Reader programme once their reading age is appropriate for this programme. From Year 3 onwards, most pupils use the Accelerated Reader programme to rehearse the reading skills taught in school.
- Sounds Write phonics intervention programme
- I.D.R. phonic and reading intervention programme
GEOGRAPHY
Subject leader: Miss L. Frampton McCready
Through this curriculum, we celebrate diversity, culture and the wonder of the world through the curiosity of investigation, exploration and sense of ownership. This is done by developing understanding and building skills of research, analysis and navigation through intertwining the thread of Environment and Fieldwork. The children will learn to recognise the versatility of landscapes, ecosystems and understand the vulnerability of the world through human interaction.
HISTORY
Subject leaders: Mrs F. Ahmed / Miss R. Iqbal
We strive to embrace curiosity, to challenge perceived ideas, and to grow a critical understanding of the world in which we live through the exploration of the worlds that got us here. Following the continual thread of leadership and justice, the children will explore a curriculum, built for them, through a methodical progression of skills and knowledge.
MATHEMATICS
Subject leaders: Miss L. Chapman / Miss S. Walker / Miss N. Perera
As our children progress through the school, we strive for them to become confident and ambitious mathematicians who can reason, solve problems and be fluent in the fundamentals of mathematics.
Our intention is for children to recognise the links between mathematics and other subjects in order for them to understand the reasons why we teach skills essential to everyday life.
Maths Policy
Currently being reviewed.
Calculation Policy
MODERN FOREIGN LANGUAGES
Subject leaders: Mr J. Kirkpatrick / Mrs E. Millett
We believe in enriching the cultural citizenship of our children through the exposure of a Spanish curriculum with the common thread of themselves. It is our aim for children to leave our school, with a solid foundation of a language used worldwide, one that can be built upon and support their ambitions and career aspirations. Learning another language can open up neural pathways which will benefit children’s learning throughout the whole curriculum, whilst learning about another culture.
MUSIC
Subject leader: Mrs A. Drew
At St Matthew’s, the children’s confidence is built up through participation in a range of musical practice. Through singing songs and learning musical instruments, children are exposed to the structure and organisation of music. They will perform, listen to, review and evaluate music from different composers, musicians and genres throughout history. They are also taught to work alongside others to compose music and perform to an audience. Our children will value and appreciate music throughout their musical journey at St Matthew’s, developing a progression of skills and knowledge along the way.
PERSONAL, SOCIAL & HEALTH EDUCATION
Subject leaders: Mrs R. Bardon / Miss J. Daniels
Through our curriculum all children develop self-confidence and positive relationships. We promote support and coping skills and ensure all learners experience and celebrate achievement and success.
Our pupils are our future community. Our curriculum takes all of our pupils on a journey which provides opportunities to develop skills and knowledge; both academic and personal, which will ensure that success is achievable for all, regardless of circumstance.
For more information about Laughology, click the logo below:
PHYSICAL EDUCATION
Subject leaders: Mr D. Chaplen / Mr T. Campbell / Mr R. Drew
Through this active and engaging curriculum we will give the children every opportunity to experience a diverse range of sports and activities. The children have time to progress skills that will help them in a wide range of activities, both in and out of sport, such as team work and learning how to win and lose. The focus is on not only on being active, but on how to support our overall well-being through understanding the importance of living a well-rounded active and healthy lifestyle. Using the thread of sporting heroes, both well-known and everyday heroes to inspire the children gives real life examples of how sport can be used to change lives. Our overarching philosophy is for children to build a love of sport and being active that they will carry with them as they progress through their lives.
RELIGIOUS EDUCATION
Subject leader: Miss M. McBarron
Religious Education is delivered to pupils in accordance with the R.E agreed syllabus for Bedford Borough, Central Bedfordshire and Luton 2018-2023.
SCIENCE
Subject leaders: Mrs E. Blunt / Mrs L. Plane / Mrs N. Koriya
We believe that science is at the core of all learning. We aim for our children to work scientifically, be investigative and be curious about the world around them. Science must be accessible to all children, developing their inquiry skills. Children will understand that scientific inquiry future proofs the next generations’ employment opportunities, from medicine to pharmaceuticals, engineering to astrophysics. Learning will be built upon prior and new knowledge, technical vocabulary alongside progressive skills. Children will be working collaboratively to ensure there is no ceiling on each child’s potential.
If you require more information than that which is included on this page, please contact admin.stmatthews@smps.uk and a senior leader will be happy to discuss our curriculum further.