Our Approach to Curriculum

Curriculum Intent

Our curriculum reflects the college’s purpose, ambition and values:

Taught by Jesus Christ, faith, hope and love inspire everything we do. We aim for the highest standards of learning, and we look for the development of wisdom. In this way the gifts possessed by every individual can be valued.

Our curriculum is ambitious for all students and provides them with a platform for success and fulfilment throughout life. It is broad, empowers independence and creativity and promotes spiritual, physical, and social health and wellbeing. In the different subject areas our curriculum is planned by teachers to support students in building up new and more complex knowledge and skill over time which is supported by what they have learned before. Teachers use the following seven principles recommended by the findings of cognitive science and the latest research and thinking when evaluating and planning their subject curriculum:

• Our curriculum is coherent: Making sure the big ideas of a subject underpin curriculum planning so it is plans are aligned and logical
• Our curriculum is sequenced: The order in which the curriculum is taught, with consideration given to the relational aspects between topics in the curriculum and how these relationships will support future learning. This shows students how previously learned knowledge and skill is necessary for new learning.
• Our curriculum is interleaved: Revisiting prior learning overtime particularly through through retrieval practice quizzes and questioning. This helps students make connections between the different parts of the curriculum and embeds learning in long-term memory
• Our curriculum is spaced: Modelling to students how to review subject content over a long period of time. This gives their minds time to form connections between ideas and concepts so knowledge can be built upon and recalled later.
• Our curriculum is deep: An ambitious curriculum for all, focused on substantive and disciplinary knowledge. This will help students develop intellectual curiosity across the range of subject disciplines 
• Our curriculum provides cultural capital: Delivering a depth of knowledge, skill and experience within subjects to all students which enables them to develop intellectual curiosity and self-belief.
• Our curriculum is contextual: Our curriculum is planned with our student profile in mind. This means our students are able to access the curriculum meaningfully and feel that it represents them and their communities.

This curriculum is planned and delivered to prepare students for a fulfilling and compassionate life in which they are able to recognise and uphold the dignity of every human being, including their own, through the way they engage with society.