Intent

At St John’s we want our children to be equipped with the computing knowledge and skills they need to access an ever changing digital world. Our Computing curriculum enables our children, from Nursery to Year 6, to build upon and develop their skills in digital literacy, computer science, information technology and internet safety to ensure children safely use, as well as understand technology. We want our children to have full, up to date awareness of the range of choices when using technology and to have the skills to access and apply their choices in a wide range of scenarios. Our intention is that Computing also supports children’s creativity and cross curricular learning to engage them and enrich their experiences in school. We set high expectations for all learners and our Computing curriculum is adapted to ensure every child can access a broad, balanced and skills rich Computing curriculum that will prepare them for life beyond primary school.

Implementation

At St John’s our whole curriculum is shaped by our school vision which aims to enable all children to Belong, Believe and Achieve, regardless of their background, ability or additional needs. Our Computing curriculum is therefore a ‘spiral’ curriculum, where knowledge and skills are taught, revisited and then built upon to ensure all children have a secure knowledge and understanding before they progress to the next steps in their Computing journey. This spiral curriculum also offers opportunities for challenge via additional units, and by application of skills in a wide variety of cross-curricular activities.

Our Computing curriculum provides a balance of device based and ‘unplugged’ learning. When children are introduced to concepts such as programming, this is done in an ‘unplugged’ way. For example, children work in pairs pretending to be robots and take turns giving each other instructions. Once this concept of programming without using any devices is understood, children can them progress applying these concepts by writing sets of instructions, programming Beebots and laying the foundations of programming knowledge and skills that can be transferable and used in many real life situations. The knowledge and skills statements in our thorough, progressive Computing curriculum build year on year to deepen learning and challenge our learners.

Impact

The implementation of this curriculum, combined with the opportunities teachers add for a wide range of cross-curricular learning and application, ensures that when children leave St John’s, they are competent and safe users of ICT with a sound understanding of how technology works. Children will have deepened and developed skills to express themselves and be creative in using a range of digital media confidently and securely. We want our children to be equipped to apply their skills in Computing to different challenges going forward. Whilst we look for evidence of impact in formative and summative approaches, we feel the way pupils engage, share, discuss, celebrate and publish their work will best show the impact of our Computing curriculum.