OUr 5 year curriculum 

• In the Science Department we have a 5 year Curriculum Journey in which students study the specifics of all three science disciplines (Chemistry, Physics and Biology). Our curriculum sequence allows for retrieval of prior knowledge at many points in those 5 years to ensure the students have a deeper understanding of key concepts and therefore a long lasting learning. We also focus on those transferable theoretical and practical skills, not just between the various topics but between all 3 science subjects so students develop complex mental models and schema, again, to ensure that learning is deep seated and long lasting. 

• Each possible misconception is then highlighted in our Scheme of Learning so it is addressed before the students can even think about it! 

• Throughout our scheme of learning there are many applications of understanding opportunities whereby the students get chance to apply their knowledge to "real life" scenarios

• There are many practical opportunities highlighted in our scheme of learning and these are designed to reflect and prepare our students for the required practical elements at GCSE in year 10 and 11. 

• Literacy, reading and cultural capital opportunities are designed to spark the interest of our students with some science in the ‘real world’. These tasks will also cover some of the enquiry processes, such as source interrogation and justifying claims, to further develop their skills in these areas. 

Formal assessments will take place at the end of each topic. These assessments are exam style questions which cover all aspects of the topic studied. Once the students have completed the assessment, they will be marked and every student will receive a personal question level analysis to determine what skills they excelled at and what are the areas for development. Each student will then be set some personalised therapy tasks which allow them to work on their own individual areas of development through the use of google classroom. 

Homework will be set every Wednesday via Seneca (a link is shared on google classroom). Seneca is an online learning platform which provides information and questions for students on topics that have been recently taught in lessons. Seneca is an intelligent platform, the more students engage with it the more the question types will become personalised to them.

Homework is considered complete when a student achieves 100% in all sections of the homework. If your child is struggling to meet 100% please contact their Science teacher who can make reasonable adjustments.