Curriculum
At Chawson 1st School we all share a united vision, that all of our children will develop into independent, articulate and aspirational children.
Our school day starts at 8:30/8:40am as a soft start and ends at 3:10pm. During this time, we use our curriculum as our main tool for providing children with the opportunities to develop these skills. Each subject contributes to us achieving this vision.
Curriculum Intent
The curriculum at Chawson First School reflects the vision of the school and incorporates all aspects of the National Curriculum. We are proud of the personalised approach that we take to the curriculum enabling us to ensure that our children can access their learning most effectively and that the knowledge, skills and concepts included are those which are most important to them. In all we do, we aim to support the children to be ready for their next stage of their learning.
The curriculum is evaluated through work scrutiny, pupil interviews, teachers’ responses and Governors’ visits into school. Modifications are made where appropriate and reflected in policy if necessary.
The knowledge and understanding to be gained at each stage of learning is detailed in the school’s reading, writing, and maths assessment materials and the Year Group over views of the curriculum. The school uses skills progression documents to ensure coverage throughout the school. The specific knowledge and key words taught during each topic are shared with parents through the half termly topic letters.
Reading
Early reading at Chawson follows Little Wandle Letters and Sounds. Reading in Year 1 and the Start of Year 2 is completed in groups with children reading the Collins Big Cat books which are in line with the Little Wandle scheme. Children work with an adult 3 times a week to apply the phonic sounds they have been learning. In Autumn 2 the Year 2 children that are ready then move to whole class guided reading and Years 3 and 4.
Within Years 3 and 4 we plan for whole class guided reading using texts to build on subject knowledge and hold the children's interests. We also use a range of reading schemes including Oxford reading tree, Project X, Songbirds and Dandelion Readers to support children of a lower ability and support teacher assessment judgements.
Reading Spine
Our reading spine is designed using books – written by inspirational authors – which we value and want the children to have read by the time they leave Chawson. They allow the children to be exposed to a range of picture, chapter and poetry books as they move up the school.
The books have been chosen to inspire, challenge and develop the children’s vocabulary, offering them storylines that they can sometimes relate to and see themselves in and sometimes offer them a glimpse into a world, scenario or culture that they have never experienced before.
Children should be read to everyday as part of their minimum entitlement and once a week, the class reader should be replaced with a poem/poems from the year group poetry anthology or selected poetry text. The books on the spine will be read to the children over the school year and added to with teacher’s own choices and at times, some non-fiction choices.
The core texts for each year group are set out below.
Please see the policies below for further information about our curriculum.
