The Intent, Implementation and Impact of our Curriculum – Science

“Science is about exploring, and the only way to uncover the secrets of the universe is to go and have a look.”   

Brian Cox

Runnymede St Edward’s Catholic Primary School understands the need for all pupils to develop their Scientific ability as an essential component of all subjects and as a subject in its own right. A good understanding of scientific knowledge and conceptual understanding helps to support pupils work across the curriculum.

Intent

At Runnymede St Edward’ s Catholic Primary School we believe that a high quality Science education provides the foundations for understanding the world through the specific disciplines of Biology, Chemistry and Physics. Science has changed our lives and is vital to the world’s future prosperity.  We actively encourage our young Edwardian’s to follow the ‘Eight Essentials of Edmund Rice Education’ and plan exciting and purposeful Science lessons to ensure they are ‘Striving for Excellence’.   We strive to deliver the National Curriculum in an exciting, enriching and engaging way.  

All pupils should be taught essential aspects of the knowledge, methods, processes and uses of Science. Through building up a body of key foundational knowledge and concepts, pupils should be encouraged to recognise the power of rational explanation and develop a sense of excitement and curiosity about natural phenomena. They should be encouraged to understand how Science can be used to explain what is occurring; predict and hypothesize how things will behave; record findings in a range of ways; analyse causes; make conclusions and suggest improvements and alterations for future investigations.

Science in our school is about developing children’s ideas and ways of working that enable them to make sense of the world in which they live through investigation, as well as through using and applying process skills. The staff at Runnymede St Edward’s Catholic Primary School ensure that all our young Edwardians are exposed to high quality teaching and learning experiences, which allow children to explore their outdoor environment and locality, thus developing their scientific enquiry and investigative skills. They are immersed in scientific vocabulary, which aids children’s knowledge and understanding not only of the topic they are studying, but of the world around them.

We seek to provide learning opportunities and experiences that will serve to raise our pupils’ cultural capital and develop connections for our learners.  We intend to provide all children, regardless of ethnic origin, gender, class, aptitude or disability, with a broad and balanced Science curriculum to prepare our learners for their future and to raise their aspirations and ignite and sustain a deep-rooted thirst for learning and quest for knowledge and answers. 

Implementation

In ensuring high standards of teaching and learning in Science, we implement a curriculum that is progressive throughout the whole school and encouragers our pupils to ‘think like Scientists’.

Planning for Science ensures that the school gives full coverage of, ‘The National Curriculum programmes of study for Science 2014’ and, ‘Understanding of the World’ in the Early Years Foundation Stage. ASE planning is also used to support our curriculum.  Science teaching at Runnymede St Edward’s Catholic Primary School involves adapting and extending the curriculum to match all pupils’ needs.  We ensure that all children are provided with rich learning experiences that aim to:

• Prepare our young Edwardian’s for life in an increasingly scientific and technological world today and in the future
• Enable our pupils to acquire a growing understanding of the nature, processes and methods of scientific ideas
• Develop and extend our children’s scientific concept of their world
• Build on our pupil’s natural curiosity and developing a scientific approach to problems
• Encourage open-mindedness, self-assessment, perseverance and developing the skills of investigation – including: observing, measuring, predicting, hypothesising, experimenting, communicating, interpreting, explaining and evaluating
• Promote and refine the use of scientific language, recording and techniques
• Include aspirational opportunities for enquiry based learning and concept-led learning to build on knowledge.
• Incorporate enriching experiences such as educational visits, workshops and  presentations to challenge, inspire and consolidate learning
• Provide ample opportunities for pupils to work independently and collaboratively
• Utilise a range of texts to support immersion of Science through fiction and non-fiction
• Ensure that key vocabulary is used to support the progression of Science through the school
• Make effective use of cross curricular subjects to enhance and support learning of Science

At Runnymede Catholic Primary School we aspire to promote independence and encourage pupils to embrace challenges and to take responsibility as they progress on their learning journey. Tasks enable the children to articulate scientific concepts clearly and precisely, assisting them in making their thinking clear, both to themselves and others.

Impact

The impact and measure of this is to ensure pupils not only acquire the appropriate age-related knowledge linked to the Science curriculum, but also skills which equip them to progress from their starting points, and within their everyday lives.

All young Edwardian’s will have:

• A wider variety of skills linked to both scientific knowledge and understanding and scientific enquiry/investigative skills
• A richer vocabulary which will enable them to articulate their understanding of taught concepts with confidence
• High aspirations which will ignite and enhance their learning journey throughout their lives
• Gained a plethora of transferable skills that can be utilised in other areas of the curriculum
• Pupils will assessed regularly (at the end of each topic) using appropriate assessment opportunities.  This will enable staff to celebrate successful learning; to ascertain any gaps in pupils’ learning; to inform future planning but also future opportunities for retrieval practice to consolidate knowledge