At Queens Road Academy, we have designed a broad, balanced, deep and challenging curriculum following detailed reflection upon the backgrounds, life experiences, abilities and needs of our pupils as well as detailed discussions with our learners around their interests and their aspirations.
We have developed a curriculum, of which we are very proud, which celebrates the very diverse community of our school alongside a comprehensive approach to the promotion of British Values and the spiritual, moral, social and cultural development of our young people.
Our curriculum has been carefully designed to provide meaningful connections between the content of the National Curriculum and a clear purpose for learning to our pupils. It is delivered, through a wide range of approaches, and in a way that ensures that key basic skills and principles are regularly revised and applied within different contexts. Many of our themes have been decided by our pupils, where possible, to ensure engagement and excitement for learning. Our units of work have been carefully crafted out to ensure full coverage of the National Curriculum content as well as a clear progression in skills, knowledge and processes, over time.
At Queens Road Academy, we want our pupils to be the very best that they can be and achieve their full potential. With this in mind, our curriculum has been created to provide challenge to all of our learners, in all subjects. We have recently adopted a mastery approach to teaching Mathematics, which constantly demands more from our pupils. We aim to transfer this demanding higher order approach across our whole curriculum, to ensure our pupils have a deep level of understanding.
At Queens Road Academy, we also place great emphasis on personal as well as academic development. We discuss, promote and develop these behaviours all throughout school life, both inside and outside of the classroom. We also aim to develop and maintain links with our local community so that our pupils feel a sense of belonging and to promote positive citizenship.
At the heart of our curriculum lies our key drivers, which as a school, we believe are fundamental to helping our pupils be prepared for the future, both at the next stages of their education and for their adult lives.
- Communication
Our school is situated in a very diverse community and we appreciate that our pupils have a range of linguistic experiences prior to starting school.
- Innovation
In a changing world, we want to ensure that our pupils are equipped for the future working world by having the skills and mindset to solve problems, embrace change and create new and better ideas.
- Curiosity
We aim to provide practical learning experiences, to foster curiosity and to create and inspire a love for learning.
- Positive Mindset
We promote a culture of self-improvement at Queens Road Academy. We aim to develop a positive growth mindset in our pupils, which will help them to succeed in their school life and beyond.
- Resilience
The ability to face challenges and difficulties is a key life skill and is particularly important for mental health. We aim to give our pupils skills and strategies to see setbacks as opportunities not problems.
- Critical Thinking
We want our pupils to leave Queens Road, knowing their own minds and being able to make clear, reasoned judgments about issues which affect their own and others lives. We know that this is an invaluable life and workplace skill.
At Queens Road Academy, we are proud to be reflective professionals and regularly evaluate and improve our curriculum to ensure that it remains engaging, broad, balanced and deep and will continue to do so with the implementation of new initiatives and agenda, where appropriate for the needs of our pupils and school.
How we make learning challenging – in a good way! (Click to find out)