Curriculum
For a number of years we have delivered the National Curriculum through a creative approach, linking or blocking subjects as appropriate. Following evaluation of what we are providing, the class structure we now have, the staff within the school and, most importantly, the children in our school, we have recently reorganised our curriculum to ensure every subject shows a clear progression of skills and knowledge. This approach ensures we are delivering what our children need in our unique school, and enables us to track the acquisition of skills and knowledge across the subjects of the National Curriculum. For the content taught in each subject in each year, click on the Learning tab above. We will update these pages as we introduce the new themes.
We are also changing the way we teach PE, having recently been trained in the REAL PE methods. This is again a skills-based approach, laying much more emphasis on the development of fundamental movement skills, leading to better core strength, agility and accuracy, which can in turn be adapted to a whole range of sports when the children are ready.
For RE, we follow the Discovery RE programme, an inquiry-driven curriculum which matches the requirements of the Locally Agreed Syllabus.
Early reading is supported through the Twinkl Phonics scheme. There is a fidelity to one programme to ensure a consistent approach.
In Reception and KS1, the children have a daily phonics session.
We teach grapheme–phoneme correspondences in a clearly defined, incremental sequence following the levels outlined in Twinkl Phonics.
Alongside each single letter grapheme being taught, there are sayings which are taught to aid children in the writing of the grapheme.
We teach children how to apply the highly important skill of blending (synthesising) phonemes in the order in which they occur, all the way through a word to read it.
We teach children to apply the skills of segmenting words into their constituent phonemes to spell.
We teach that blending and segmenting are reversible processes.
After each Level has been taught, the children will be assessed. Children who need extra support will be identified and interventions will be put into place.
The children begin using our early reading books (Bug Club, Rhino Reader books plus books by other publishers) which run alongside the teaching of phonics. The books have been sorted into sets for each level of phonics.
For those children who: are able to decode and recognise words on sight, who make use of other strategies than the phonics approach, who have gone beyond level 5, they select books from the Stower Provost Banded Reading Scheme.
After completing the colour-band stages, the children become Free-readers and select a book from the library or from their own collection.
Please click here to view our Stower Provost Curriculum Overview
Special Education Needs and Disabilities
Our school aims to meet the individual needs and develop the full potential of every child in the school. Some children have special educational needs but not all children with special educational needs are children with learning difficulties and the very able child may also require individual support.
Initial identification of children’s needs is made by the class teacher who discusses concerns with the parents/carers and the SEND Co-ordinator. Individual education plans to support the child are drawn up and interventions are agreed. The advice and support of outside agencies may also be sought and sometimes assessments are arranged. Where necessary, the school can request that children are seen by the Audiologist or the Speech Therapist. The school has recently been adapted with acoustic facilities for hearing impaired children.
The Special Needs Co-ordinator liaises closely with all members of staff and ensures that the Governors are kept informed of the support work being undertaken.
Throughout the provision of learning support for all children with SEND there will be due regard for the Special Needs Code of Practice and the very important links between home and school.
If you want to read our SEND policy please SEN-policy-2022-2023 and details of our approach in full please click here for our SEND Information Report.
You can also find further information on the Dorset Council website: CLICK HERE.