Science
What is the intent of our science curriculum?
Our ambitious, knowledge-rich curriculum has been sequenced to equip our pupils with the knowledge and skills to ensure they are happy, healthy global citizens, ready to take their place in modern Britain. The broad and balanced curriculum is creative, coherent and inclusive and, together with our Christian values, enables the pupils to be self-motivated, independent learners.
At John Keble, we desire to give every pupil to develop scientific knowledge and conceptual understanding through the specific disciplines of biology, chemistry and physics. They will develop understanding of the nature, processes and methods of science through different types of science enquiries that help them to answer scientific questions about the world around them. Finally, pupils will be equipped with the scientific knowledge required to understand the uses and implications of science, today and for the future.
How do we implement our science curriculum at John Keble?
When do we teach scientific enquiry skills at John Keble school?
What is the impact of our science curriculum?
The units in the science curriculum are grouped by key stage, with a suggested route organised within year groups. The substantive knowledge (i.e. the science content) will be taught in units, and the disciplinary knowledge (i.e. working scientifically) is taught in context. Hierarchical elements of working scientifically are reflected in the units and built up accordingly. Each unit is rich in vocabulary and working scientifically is woven into most lessons. The curriculum is designed to be able to support all pupils. The units are pitched so that pupils with different starting points can access them. Pupils need to have a large amount of subject knowledge stored in their long-term memory in order to become competent at any subject, and this is especially true of science, where application is often an application of knowledge. For this reason, these lessons are designed to teach science in a clear and deliberate fashion, emphasising secure content knowledge before moving on to tasks. In this approach, the teacher is the subject expert and the emphasis is on instruction and explanation, followed by deliberate practice supported by modelling, guided practice and scaffolding. Models and analogies will be used where appropriate to allow pupils to visualise or contextualise abstract ideas. At the end of each unit, pupils will be given an end of unit task. This will be an opportunity for the pupils to showcase their learning and what they have understood in a task. Class teachers will be able to use it as a tool to assess the pupils. For a more in depth look at our Science Curriculum, download the link.