Design Technology
Intent: At St Mary’s we aim to provide all children with a broad and balanced curriculum which prepares them for life beyond primary education. We encourage children to use their creativity and imagination, to design and make products that solve real and relevant problems within a variety of contexts, considering their own and others’ needs, wants and values. Design and Technology is an inspiring, rigorous and practical subject. It is found in the objects children use each day and is a part of children’s immediate experiences.
Design and Technology encourages children to learn to think and intervene creatively to solve problems both as individuals and as members of a team. D&T allows children to apply the knowledge and skills learned in other subjects, particularly Maths, Science and Art, giving children motivation and meaning for their learning.
At St Mary’s the curriculum for Design and Technology aims to ensure that all pupils:
• develop the creative, technical and practical expertise needed to perform
everyday tasks confidently and to participate successfully in an increasingly
technological world.
• build and apply a repertoire of knowledge, understanding and skills in order to
design and make high-quality prototypes and products for a wide range of users.
• critique, evaluate and test their ideas and products and the work of others
• understand and apply the principles of nutrition and learn how to cook.
Implementation: To ensure high standards of teaching and learning in Art and Design, we implement a curriculum that is progressive throughout the whole school. Art and design is taught as part of a half-termly or termly topic, focusing on knowledge and skills stated in the National Curriculum which provides a broad framework and outlines the knowledge and skills and taught in each Key Stage. Teachers plan their Art and Design lessons suitable to their class’s interests and what they want to learn. The art scheme of work ensures the curriculum is covered and the skills/knowledge taught is progressive from year group to year group.
We provide a variety of opportunities for art and design learning inside and outside the classroom, this includes enrichment visits to museums ( on-line too) , art galleries and visits by subject experts.
Impact: Impact is measured through pupil discussions about their learning; which includes discussion of their thoughts, ideas, processing and evaluation of work.
The opportunity for children to refine and develop their techniques over time is supported by effective lesson sequencing and progression between year groups. This supports children in achieving age related expectations in DT at the end of their cohort year. We track progress through Target Tracker.
By the end of their time with us, we want pupils to have learned, improved and embedded a range of DT skills.
By the time children leave our school they will have :