Stoneraise School

At Stoneraise School, our vision statement is: 

 

‘Living and learning together to care for each other and our world.’

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Our curriculum has been designed to focus the children’s learning on this statement. We are based on the rural outskirts of the historic city of Carlisle and the majority of our pupils travel from local housing estates within the city. We try to make the very most of our beautiful surroundings at every opportunity. From Hadrian’s Wall to the mountains of the Lake District, we ensure that our children gain an awe of the majestic landscape on our doorstep. Developing friendships, keeping ourselves safe and preparing our children to be the ‘citizens of tomorrow’ are all key parts of our curriculum as we follow the journey on our 'Pathway to Success'.

 

Our curriculum ensures excellent coverage of the National Curriculum (Years 1-6) and Early Years Foundation Stage (Reception children).  We have fully embraced the higher expectations set out in both curriculums and have devised our own units of work for each subject area so that we can ensure a sound progression of learning. We also have a core team of specialist teachers who are passionate about their curriculum area; these teachers work with different groups of children each year. Our team includes PE, music, art and computing specialists.

 

As a teaching team, working alongside our dedicated team of governors, we have designed our curriculum so that we meet the children ‘where they are’; we seek to truly ‘learn together’ by gaining an understanding of what we know already, what we need/want to find out, how we are going to get there and how we know we’ve succeeded. Pupils share their views through a variety of pupil voice activities and our School Council actively works to improve our learning environment and develop teaching and learning through school. Our award-winning school garden is a haven for all pupils to become green-fingered and have an appreciation for nature.

 

Our ‘Sticky Knowledge’ approach is used to help children to be aware of what they will learn through each unit or topic and help staff and pupils to make an assessment of what has been learned. We share key knowledge that we would like to ‘stick’ in the children’s long term memory, present vital vocabulary they will come across to encourage the children to expand and develop their use of a wide range of words. Sticky notes (which include word banks, diagrams and other important information) are often used to support the children in the short term in their learning.

 

To ensure clear, cyclical, coherent and strategic curriculum progression, we have set out our curriculum with key learning and skills that will be revisited as the children move through Stoneraise School. Topics have been carefully selected to take into account our surroundings. An enquiry question is usually presented at the start of a topic then the children will begin to ask their own questions as we move through the sequence of learning. For instance, in History, we have a focus on the Romans. Our key question is, “What impact do the ancient Romans still have on us today?” Through this topic we explore the impact of the Romans on our society by exploring evidence from the past (using a wide range of artefacts and other primary and secondary sources). Taking this further, to help contextualisation, we visit local museums e.g. Senhouse Roman Museum and take the children to ‘touch the wall’ at Housesteads Fort. Meeting a Roman soldier on the wall is always a key highlight and this helps the children to literally ‘get their hands on’ the fantastic history of our nation. English Heritage even used our school in a promotional video for their website, interviewing our pupils about their learning on Romans.  Although we have a topic-based approach, we do not want the study of history, geography, French etc, to be lost so we have maintained discrete lessons where the key driver for the lesson remains. We aim to tie our learning together, linking back to what we know already and exploring how what we are learning links to our historical timeline. 

 

Through our assemblies, we explore key questions which link to our vision. For instance, “How can I achieve a growth mindset?”, “Where do people go to worship?”, “What do charities do?” and, “How can I help the environment?” Beginning each assembly with a piece from our ‘Composer of the Week’ gives the children the chance to experience a wide range of classical music, exploring the style, orchestral instruments involved and history of the composer. We welcome visitors from the community and further afield into school on a regular basis. Regular fundraising events for charities are commonplace and we act as a drop-off point of Carlisle Foodbank. 

 

As we reside in such a rural location, we aspire to teach our children about the wider world. Giving the children opportunities to learn about others from different faiths, cultures, ethnicities and other life experiences is key to helping our children prepare for life in modern-day Britain. An annual visit to London gives our children the chance to see a multicultural metropolis and also helps to tie learning together through their time in Key Stage 2. Visiting the Tower London and seeing King Henry VIII’s armour, exploring the Houses of Parliament during a guided tour and even speaking to Nick Gibb (Schools Minister), helps our children to see first-hand the importance of our British Values. Other educational visits, residential and trips are all planned to take into account key learning that the children can acquire.