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Curriculum
We have a knowledge-based curriculum, structured by traditional subjects, properly sequenced to ensure systematic, thorough teaching for all.
We also offer rich cultural pursuits as essential activities, championing access and involvement in arts and sport. Our school uses a robust collegial approach that promotes sustained improvement.
Long-term learning
The curriculum at Wayland Academy is designed with long term learning in mind, students should be able to take what they learn into adulthood and use it to provide them with opportunities to succeed in life. The curriculum takes students beyond what they already know and enables them to be more socially mobile. It ensures that students acquire knowledge that they wouldn’t ordinarily have access to.
- Our curriculum is based upon the principle that all students will acquire an understanding of their subjects and gain mastery of a body of subject-specific knowledge that we have defined. This will provide capacity for students to learn even more and develop their understanding.
- Our aim is that no matter what a child’s social disadvantage or prior learning, students will be able to access knowledge. An example of this is our work with Accelerated Reader in Year 7 to 9, we are fully aware of the links between reading and accessing the curriculum.
- Every student has equal access to the curriculum and their progress is rooted in what we expect them to know at each stage of their education. Just like our vision, we want students to know the ‘Big IDEAs’ in subjects and we expect teachers to plan learning for every lesson in this way. We see the importance of making the curriculum relevant and meaningful to students, that way it becomes transferable and allows them to build links across subject areas.
When teachers plan their lessons, leaders have an expectation that they demonstrate not only what they are delivering but, ‘how’. Subject-specific vocabulary is emphasised in all lessons. Formative and summative assessment is used to capture student progress throughout the academic year. Gaps in knowledge, skills and depth of understanding are identified, informing future lesson planning, as well as subject-specific curriculum design. Heads of Faculty and Lead Professionals are given a level of autonomy to structure and plan the teaching of their subject as they have the specialist knowledge and expertise.
“Inspectors will take a rounded view of the quality of education that a school provides to all its pupils, including the most disadvantaged pupils, the most able pupils and pupils with SEND. Inspectors will consider the school’s curriculum, which is the substance of what is taught with a specific plan of what pupils need to know in total, and in each subject.”
“Inspectors will consider the extent to which the school’s curriculum sets out the knowledge and skills that pupils will gain at each stage (intent). They will also consider the way that the curriculum selected by the school is taught and assessed in order to support pupils to build their knowledge and to apply that knowledge as skills (implementation). Finally, inspectors will consider the outcomes that pupils achieve as a result of the education they have received (impact).”
The curriculum sets out the aims of a programme of education. It also sets out the structure for those aims to be implemented, including the knowledge, skills and understanding to be gained at each stage. It enables the evaluation of pupils’ knowledge and understanding against those expectations.
