Swillington Primary School curriculum intent
At Swillington Primary School, our mission is to provide a transformative cradle to career education that allows our children to enjoy lives of choice and opportunity.
At Swillington, we create designers and technologists by fostering a love and enjoyment of design and technology. We provide high quality DT lessons which are creative, inspiring and relevant.
Design and technology is taught through a broad an balanced curriculum so that children are able to foster creativity and imagination through their work. Design and technology has a clear progression of skills built on year by year and sequenced appropriately so that it maximises learning for all children.
Lessons incorporate design, make and evaluate cycle, each stage is rooted into the technical knowledge.
The design process is relevant so that it links to real life and gives children a meaning to their learning.
The making process gives children choice and a range of tools to choose from so that they can imagine the possibilities with their ideas.
Children will use subject specific, rich language to evaluate their own designs against a success criteria so that they become critical thinkers.
Finding the talent as a design and technologist through an ability to present their ideas by imagining the possibilities. Children will keep safe through the use of a range of tools.
National Curriculum aims
The national curriculum for design and technology aims to ensure that all pupils:
- develop the creative, technical and practical expertise needed to perform everyday tasks confidently and to participate successfully in an increasingly technological world;
- build and apply a repertoire of knowledge, understanding and skills in order to design and make high-quality prototypes and products for a wide range of users;
- critique, evaluate and test their ideas and products and the work of others;
- understand and apply the principles of nutrition and learn how to cook.
Key stage 1
Through a variety of creative and practical activities, pupils should be taught the knowledge, understanding and skills needed to engage in an iterative process of designing and making.
They should work in a range of relevant contexts, for example, the home and school, gardens and playgrounds, the local community, industry and the wider environment.
When designing and making, pupils should be taught to:
Design:
- design purposeful, functional, appealing products for themselves and other users based on design criteria;
- generate, develop, model and communicate their ideas through talking, drawing, templates, mockups and, where appropriate, information and communication technology.
Make:
- select from and use a range of tools and equipment to perform practical tasks, for example, cutting, shaping, joining and finishing;
- select from and use a wide range of materials and components, including construction materials, textiles and ingredients, according to their characteristics,
Evaluate:
- explore and evaluate a range of existing products;
- evaluate their ideas and products against design criteria.
Technical knowledge:
- build structures, exploring how they can be made stronger, stiffer and more stable;
- explore and use mechanisms, for example, levers, sliders, wheels and axles, in their products
Key Stage 2
Through a variety of creative and practical activities, pupils should be taught the knowledge, understanding and skills needed to engage in an iterative process of designing and making.
They should work in a range of relevant contexts, for example, the home, school, leisure, culture, enterprise, industry and the wider environment.
When designing and making, pupils should be taught to:
Design:
- use research and develop design criteria to inform the design of innovative, functional, appealing products that are fit for purpose, aimed at particular individuals or groups;
- generate, develop, model and communicate their ideas through discussion, annotated sketches, cross-sectional and exploded diagrams, prototypes, pattern pieces and computer-aided design.
Make:
- select from and use a wider range of tools and equipment to perform practical tasks, for example, cutting, shaping, joining and finishing, accurately;
- select from and use a wider range of materials and components, including construction materials, textiles and ingredients, according to their functional properties and aesthetic qualities.
Evaluate:
- investigate and analyse a range of existing products;
• evaluate their ideas and products against their own design criteria and consider the views of others to improve their work; - understand how key events and individuals in design and technology have helped shape the world.
Technical knowledge:
- apply their understanding of how to strengthen, stiffen and reinforce more complex structures;
- understand and use mechanical systems in their products, for example, gears, pulleys, cams, levers and linkages. Understand and use electrical systems in their products, for example, series circuits incorporating switches, bulbs, buzzers and motors;
- apply their understanding of computing to program, monitor and control their products.
