Our School
At Gilded Hollins Community School we are committed to creating a learning environment in which both children and adults feel happy, safe, secure and valued.
The curriculum is all the planned activities that we organise in order to promote learning and personal growth and development. The National Curriculum came into force in September 2014. It is split into Core subjects (English, Maths and Science) and Foundation Subjects. Our curriculum is designed not only to fulfil all the statutory requirements, but also to inspire our children with a love for learning and all other aspects of life.
Curriculum Intent
At Gilded Hollins, we recognise that there are certain areas where our children excel. They are willing to try new things, they are confident, good at asking, ‘Why?’, willing to interact and trusting of others. They want to do well.
However, we also agreed that there are areas where we want to help our children to grow.
We shall, as a school, increase their resilience, building their ability to cope with, and learn from, making mistakes; learning to use struggle as a positive learning tool – accepting that some things in life will not be easy to attain and will need a great deal of effort, resilience and perseverance to achieve. If it’s too easy, is it worth it?
We also recognise that our children need time to read - both for enjoyment and to gain knowledge. It is by reading that we aim to increase their vocabulary; as well as through targeted activities within our classroom teaching. By choosing engaging texts and activities we aim to improve our children’s love of language and the written word: the content of which forms a virtuous circle to reflect their newly acquired vocabulary from reading.
The curriculum will help our children to:
To achieve these aims, the curriculum is planned to be:
We have a rich and varied array of enrichment opportunities to engage learning, celebrate difference and nurture talent. Our pupils will have a positive self-esteem and a strong sense of self, leaving us with the unshakeable inner confidence of a leader.
Organisation and Planning
We plan our curriculum in three phases:
The National Curriculum ensures that there is an equal balance of knowledge and skills that are built upon progressively at each stage of the child’s development. Each curriculum area at Gilded Hollins has their own ‘Progression of Skills’ document which outlines exactly what is taught in each year group, ensuring clarity of purpose for all teachers. This ensures that each year builds upon the knowledge of the years that go before, enabling children to increase their knowledge and skills in a systematic and planned way.
Each subject is taught as a single subject to ensure full coverage of the subject matter in terms of knowledge and skills.
Foundation subjects are delivered using a mastery model whereby children are able to explore content in increasing depth and complexity as they move through school. Knowledge and skills are developed using an enquiry based approach. The questions make sense to the children and are within their range of understanding, designed so that they may be studied over time, building towards a real understanding of what they have learnt.
Time is taken at the beginning of each subject focus to find out about any preconceptions and misunderstandings, and in doing so, teachers are able to tailor their planning to the individual needs of their classes.
We believe strongly in enhancing our children’s learning through various visits and visitors linked to the curriculum. Visitors have included authors, Olympic athletes and an explorer to name but a few. Children have visited places to enhance various areas of the curriculum including history, art, religious education, science and others.
Religious Education following the Wigan Council ‘Sacre’ scheme of work, an enquiry-based approach to learning that focuses on improving standards of religious literacy and has an academic rigour that will equip pupils with the knowledge and skills to engage with religious issues and world views.
Personal, Health and Social Education following the SCARF scheme of work, enhanced by the Life Education Bus Project & a variety of workshops E.g. Wigan's DIAS team.
Physical Education is enhanced by the expertise of Specialist Sports Coaches who teach alongside our own staff, thereby not only developing expertise but allowing a targeted approach to the delivery of this curriculum to different groups of children.
We deliver a range of extra-curricular activities, which include creative and physical opportunities.
We also strive to develop and uphold British Values, i.e. Democracy; The Rule of Law; Individual Liberty and Mutual Respect and Tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs; Developing Personal and Social Responsibility and Respect for British Institutions.
To find out more about the intent, implementation and impact of each curriculum area, please take a look at our individual subject area tabs.
We aim that children leave Gilded Hollins with a secure understanding of the academic content studied and an innate sense of belief in their own ability.
We want them to be socially, morally, spiritually and culturally responsible and aware; to know how to make positive contributions to others and how to be the best that they can be. We aim for all of our children to leave us as respectful, kind, ambitious people who have the self confidence to go and make a difference in the world.