'The curriculum should be designed so that it is worth knowing, worth understanding and worth remembering.'
 

Jerome Bruner

Our curriculum vision: 

At Bedford Primary School, we are committed to providing a broad, balanced and engaging curriculum that supports every child’s academic, physical and creative development. We are passionate about ensuring every child fulfils their potential and becomes a well-rounded, well-educated citizen with the knowledge and skills needed to succeed in life.

Our curriculum is underpinned by the National Curriculum which sets out what pupils are expected to know and understand. However, our curriculum goes further, providing our children with the wider knowledge, skills and understanding that reflect the unique character of our school, our local community and our pupils’ needs.

Curriculum design is a continual process of reviewing and refining. We are committed to making sure it remains inclusive, ambitious and responsive to the needs of our pupils - including those with SEND, disadvantaged pupils and those facing barriers to learning.

Parents, carers and members of the public can find out more about our curriculum by:

• Visiting our individual subject pages on the school website
• Speaking to your child’s class teacher
• Contacting the school office on 0151 922 1467 with any questions or queries 

Intent:

Our curriculum has been carefully designed to reflect our local context and to build the cultural capital that broadens the horizons of every pupil. It is knowledge-rich and progressively sequenced to ensure children build on what they already know, enabling them to know more, remember more and do more.

Our aims are to ensure that:

• Every child experiences a wide breadth of study that develops their knowledge, skills and confidence.
• By the end of each key stage, pupils have a secure long-term memory of an ambitious body of knowledge.
• Oracy is at the heart of our curriculum: children are explicitly taught to communicate effectively, articulate ideas, develop understanding and engage confidently through speaking and listening.
• Our curriculum fosters a love of reading, extends pupils’ vocabulary and develops language skills across all subjects.
• Pupils gain the skills to think and act like geographers, historians, scientists, artists and designers, immersing themselves fully in each subject discipline.
• Our bespoke PSHE curriculum, including a careers framework, ensures that pupils develop confidence, resilience and aspiration for the future.

Implementation:

Our curriculum is deliberately planned and sequenced so that all pupils can access learning and make progress over time.

• All subjects are taught discretely, with progression of knowledge and skills mapped from EYFS to Year 6.
• Key knowledge for each subject is clearly identified, forming the basis of our long-term planning.
• Retrieval practice is embedded across the curriculum to strengthen children’s recall and transfer of knowledge into their long-term memory.
• Teachers present new learning clearly, check pupils’ understanding systematically and adapt teaching to ensure everyone can access the curriculum.
• We prioritise language development and reading fluency, ensuring pupils have the vocabulary and comprehension skills to access all areas of the curriculum.
• Our teaching develops both substantive knowledge (facts and concepts) and disciplinary knowledge (ways of thinking and working as a subject specialist).
• Leaders continually review the quality of the curriculum and teaching, ensuring that it remains ambitious, inclusive and well-matched to the needs of all learners.
• Where needed, we make reasonable adjustments to support pupils with SEND and remove barriers to learning, so every child can participate fully and thrive!