Federation Science Curriculum
Ethos and Mindset
At Prestbury St Mary’s Federation, our science curriculum is designed to encourage children to be curious, explore and experiment and build an openness to new ideas through a collaborative learning environment. Our pupils live in an ever-changing world and we ensure our science curriculum evolves and keeps up to date with changes. Our own, bespoke progression of skills has been carefully developed for each strand of science where we identify the key learning outcomes for each unit of work. This ensures children’s learning meets the expectations of the National Curriculum, building in depth and complexity as they move through the school.
Our planning identifies key vocabulary, potential misconceptions and ongoing assessment opportunities. Each unit of work also identifies texts that link to the topic which can be used to increase children’s engagement in the subject. We make sure that teaching of subject knowledge (substantive) is delivered through scientific investigation (disciplinary learning) which threads through all of our science topics. We use the five strands of scientific enquiry throughout the Federation, ensuring the same symbols for each of these approaches to provide children with consistency and to develop their understanding of how scientists work.
Science is given the status of a core subject through dedicated, regular scheduled teaching time. Opportunities to discuss, reason, think critically and justify ideas are woven into all our science lessons.