Curriculum Principles
Safeguarding Statement
At Cheetham CE Community Academy we are committed to safeguarding and promoting the safety and welfare of all our children.
Safeguarding is everybody’s responsibility. This safeguarding statement applies to all staff, governors, volunteers, and other adults working in, or on behalf of, our school. It is an over-arching document that pulls together all our safeguarding policies and procedures, including our Safeguarding Policy which can be found on the school website.
All school staff undertake annual child protection training, and children are made aware of the adults they can talk to if they have any concerns. We know how important it is to listen to our pupils and take seriously what they tell us. Staff are trained to look out for signs of physical/emotional harm or neglect and are required to report these to the Designated Safeguarding Lead (DSL), Mrs Wildgoose. There is also a wider team of DSLs, who concerns can also be reported to; Mrs Bruno, Mrs Zaman, Mrs Gallagher and Mrs Tigue. On rare occasions where our concern about a child means that we have to consult other agencies, we ensure that these concerns are discussed with parent/carers first in line with our Safeguarding Policy.
Please click here to read our safeguarding policy.
Click here to read our safeguarding essentials for staff.
Click here for our EYFS & KS1 child friendly safeguarding policy and here for our KS2 child friendly policy.
Curriculum Principles
Vision
At Cheetham Church of England Community Academy we have faith in the uniqueness of every child and adult, and together we strive to use our gifts and talents to serve others and achieve the best for everyone.
1 Peter 4:10 Each of you should use whatever gift you have received to serve others, as faithful stewards of God’s grace in its various forms
Aims & Principles
Our curriculum is designed to suit every child and ensures that our children are equipped with the skills to embrace all possibilities available to them in our diverse world. We will endeavour to develop children who have enquiring minds and increased aspirations for the future.
We aim to whet the appetite for learning and prepare them for their future by ensuring they will be able to:
- Make considered choices in order to develop individual talents and passions
- Be confident communicators – who are reflective, adapt to change and demonstrate resilience
- Be an active member of a cohesive community – understand how learning relates to their community in order to make positive contributions
We believe that every member of our school community has a responsibility to teach children how to maintain a healthy, happy lifestyle and manage their own emotions, for this reason the rights of the child are central to all aspects of teaching and learning (Article 24,28,29).
Drivers
Our curriculum will be based on the following drivers
Communication (friendship)
The development of language skills and the building of vocabulary allow our children to communicate with confidence and fluency in a variety of situations across all areas of learning. We believe that helping our children find their voice is as important as becoming avid readers or great writers.
Diversity (friendship, courage and love)
Children are given a range of experiences, which allow them to build and connect knowledge in a meaningful way. Through this immersion children are encouraged to embrace difference, develop cultural awareness and celebrate the commonalities we share.
Spirituality (trust, forgiveness and love)
Children are given opportunities to look inwards to deepen their understanding of themselves, their beliefs, values and feelings and to gain inner peace. In looking outwards they develop emotional awareness of others and understand/reflect on the awe and mystery of the natural world and environment. Christian values and the love of God are at the heart of our teaching and learning.
We nurture individual talents and passions and encourage children to reach their full potential. These are the ways in which we ensure children have wider possibilities to explore for the rest of their lives.
Through planning and delivering exciting, real-life themes to our children, we will ensure that all pupils of Cheetham CE Community Academy leave us having experienced a wide range of opportunities that help them shine as individuals and serve one another well.
Breadth and balance statement
Our curriculum provides a broad range of experiences for our pupils:
Our pupils backgrounds, our culture and climate for learning provide the above drivers that underpin all areas of our curriculum.
We offer a thoughtful range of experiences that support our culture: pupils enjoy a ‘full spectrum’ of academic, physical, spiritual, moral, cultural activities that enrich their lives and give them the confidence and skills for a fulfilled and happy life.
Our curriculum provides appropriate balance:
We believe that all children should feel a sense of accomplishment in a wide range of areas. Our curriculum therefore gives an excellent mix of academic and personal development; it gives equal importance to core and foundation subjects; physical wellbeing and mental well being are all valued, understood and prioritised by our curriculum design.
Spiritual, moral, social and cultural development, along with a well planned and structured programme of personal development, underpins all our work and is monitored alongside academic subjects.
We carefully balance the requirement for pupils to reach national expectations in core subjects with our wider curriculum aims of providing a full spectrum of thoughtful and enriching experiences. As a result our pupils thrive.
Our curriculum is carefully organised for depth:
We define progress as: The widening and deepening of essential skills, understanding and behaviours. To do this ensure pupils don’t merely cover the curriculum but repeat it over and over – each time return to areas they gain a deeper and more insightful understanding of the matters, skills and processes within subjects.
We refer to the cognitive domains of Basic, Advancing and Deep learning to describe the nature of progression. This involves changing the nature of thinking rather than just acquiring new knowledge. Below is a table that shows the nature of learning in each cognitive domain.
