Computing at Firs

Ready For Learning and Ready For Life.

Firs Primary School is committed to ensuring all children are able to access a knowledge-rich, broad and balanced curriculum with teaching and learning being at the heart of the delivery of the curriculum. It aims to be bold, free thinking and rigorous; underpinned by a commitment to the school values, ensuring equity, learner empowerment and encouraging social mobility.  An essential element of our knowledge rich curriculum is the development of a broad and rich vocabulary, and the ambitious and explicit teaching of this.  A renewed focus on speech and language is a key driver of the revised curriculum and this is supported by the Voice21 scheme to develop Oracy in the classroom.

Computing

Live:  Children will have the knowledge and understanding to go into their next stage of life appreciating the important role of computing both in our leisure and our working lives.

Love:  Children will develop a love and passion for computing that will last a lifetime.

Learn: Children will ask questions to understand the importance of computing; seek to use computing in their leisure time; and find ways to use computing in their everyday lives.

Aims of the Computing curriculum:

Due to computing being an essential part of most jobs, including those not yet invented, Firs have tailored an information technology curriculum that offers high quality computing teaching plus opportunities to use a range of hardware and software in all curriculum areas in order to prepare our children for the future.  Opportunities are provided for children to use a range of software and hardware in other curriculum areas.  All children are encouraged to use desktop computers and iPads to research information in other subjects.  All children are encouraged to use computing in their homework, they will also have access to Purple Mash resources at home.

Progression in the Computing curriculum:

As a school, we have chosen the Purple Mash Computing Scheme of Work from Reception to Year 6. The scheme of work supports our teachers in delivering fun and engaging lessons which help to raise standards and allow all pupils to achieve to their full potential. We are confident that the scheme of work more than adequately meets the national vision for Computing. It provides immense flexibility, strong cross-curricular links and integrates perfectly with the 2Simple Computing Assessment Tool.

Explicit knowledge in the Computing curriculum:

Early Years: We aim to provide our children with a broad, play-based experience of Computing in a range of contexts.  Early Years learning environments will feature ICT scenarios based on experience in the real world, such as in role-play.  Children gain confidence, control and language skills through opportunities to ‘paint’ on the interactive board/devices or control remotely operated toys.

Key Stage 1:  Children will understand what algorithms are, how they are implemented as programs on digital devices, and that programs execute by following a sequence of instructions.  Children will write and test simple programs.

Key Stage 2:  Children will design and write programs that accomplish specific goals, including controlling or simulating physical systems; solve problems by decomposing them into smaller parts.  Describe how Internet search engines find and store data; use search engines effectively; be discerning in evaluating digital content; respect individuals and intellectual property; use technology responsibly, securely and safely.  Use sequence, selection and repetition in programs; work with variables and various forms of input and output; generate appropriate inputs and predicted outputs to test programs.

Curriculum organisation of the Computing curriculum:

All year groups have timetabled access to computer room and set of i-pads each week.  Year 1 to Year 6 will all teach online safety and coding units.

Reading, writing and talking in the Computing curriculum:

The curriculum overview is carefully constructed to include different areas underpinned by Reading, Writing and Talking.  Computing will encourage children to discuss their ideas by bringing reading and writing skills together in the classroom.  The curriculum will help children work together at different times through google documents and develop language / communication skills. The computing curriculum will use technology to allow children to explore a range of media and develop language skills and reading.  The curriculum will focus on improving vocabulary building and usage through the use of online dictionaries.  Children will be required to draft and write emails, create programmes

Delivery of the Computing curriculum:

At Firs our vision for Teaching and Learning is rooted in high expectations and an unconditional belief that every child can achieve and succeed according to their unique abilities. We believe in challenge, engagement and deep learning (mastery). This is promoted through careful curriculum planning, modelled examples of practice and the use of responsive teaching through planned and purposeful checking for understanding. A positive and stimulating learning environment ensure behaviour for learning is central to our vision, as we strive for a warm and productive classroom climate. We carefully plan assessment to ensure we develop retrieval and schema to build on learning and make connections between subjects.  Finally, we explicitly plan for the delivery of Reading, Talking and Vocabulary in all subjects and this underpins our approach to teaching and learning at Firs.

Firs Foundation of Effective Practice ensures we have a whole school approach to delivering our curriculum vision.  The six Foundations provide staff with a learning model to ensure we deliver lessons based on research evidence, the six Foundations we model our Teaching and Learning on:

Foundation 1: Culture and Climate.

Foundation 2: Checking For Understanding.

Foundation 3: Explaining and Modelling.

Foundation 4: Reading, Talking and Vocabulary.

Foundation 5: Curriculum Planning.

Foundation 6: Retrieval and Schema building. 

In summary the impact of a powerful knowledge Computing curriculum at Firs will have the following features:

• Subject driven.
• Knowledge-rich.
• Systematic.
• Progressive.
• Children are aware of the benefits and dangers of the internet
• Children know how to use the internet safely
• Children are confident in using the internet for research
• Children are confident in producing music, films, podcasts and games
• Children understand algorithms and programming
• Children are aware of future jobs in the computing industry and that they have the skills to work in jobs that are not yet invented
• Ensure children are Ready For Learning and Ready For Life.