Curriculum

At Heathcoat Primary we work hard to deliver an exciting and relevant curriculum to all of our learners. We have fully adopted the New National Curriculum and have used this opportunity to design brand new topic as vehicles through which the children access a variety of subject areas. We enjoy being flexible and incorporate the children’s own ideas into the topics that we plan and then teach. As a result, planning is always being adapted and changed to meet our learner’s needs.

Read our current newsletters here:

Nursery Newsletter Autumn 2023

Reception Newsletter Autumn 2023

Year 1 Newsletter Autumn 2023

Year 2 Newsletter Autumn 2023

Year 3/4 Newsletter Autumn 2023

Year 5 Newsletter Autumn 2023

Year 6 Newsletter Autumn 2023

Curriculum Maps

The links below will take you to the curriculum maps for each of the year groups across the school. To find out more about our curriculum please contact your child’s class teacher or team leader.

Intent, Implementation and Impact statements

The curriculum at Heathcoat Primary School

Progression of skills:

Art – progression of skills 2021-22

DT – progression of skills 2021-22

Geography – progression of skills 2021-22

French – progression of skills 2021-22

History – progression of skills 2021-22

ICT Computing – progression of skills 2021-22

Maths Curriculum Key Skills Progression grid 2021-22

Music – progression of skills 2022-23

PSHE – progression of skills 2021-22

PE -Curriculum 22-23 update

RE – progression of skills 2021-22

Reading – progression of skills 2021-22

Science – progression of skills 2022-23

Writing – progression of skills 2021 -22

Reading and Phonics

At Heathcoat Primary School, the reading curriculum is designed to create passionate readers. Children, from Nursery to Year 6, enjoy listening to a variety of stories, poems and information texts during the daily, shared class-read. The texts used during the class-read are purposefully selected as part of our reading spine, and include well-loved classics as well as more contemporary texts that offer a more diverse range of authors, characters and perspectives. Children at Heathcoat Primary School enjoy the Scholastic book fair that comes twice a year and they enjoy participating in the annual summer reading challenge at Tiverton library.

To support children on their journey to becoming avid and passionate readers, Heathcoat Primary School teach early reading using the Read, Write, Inc. Phonics programme, which teaches children how to decode the words on the page and how to comprehend what they have read. The Read, Write, Inc. Phonics programme provides a structured approach to teaching reading, whereby the sequence of reading books provides cumulative progression in the children’s phonics knowledge, reading accuracy, reading pace, comprehension skills and the fluency with which children read texts using their storyteller voice.

Upon completing the Read, Write, Inc. Phonics programme, children are taught more complex comprehension skills using the Read, Write, Inc. Comprehension programme, which provides engaging and more challenging texts. In conjunction with the Read, Write, Inc. Comprehension programme, children freely access a range of books from the library, using Accelerated Reader to support their choice text and check their understanding of the text through regular quizzes and half-termly reading tests.

In Key Stage Two, children are taught reading using a range of genres and text types selected from Literacy Shed. The teaching of reading in Key Stage Two builds on the reading skills taught in the Early Years and Key Stage One, with a continued focus on reading fluently, understanding vocabulary and comprehending more complex texts. During the Key Stage Two reading lessons, teachers teach children the comprehension skills linked to content domains of the National Curriculum, using the acronym VIPERS. The letters of the acronym represent: vocabulary, infer, predict, explain, retrieve and summarise. Children in Key Stage Two continue to use Accelerated Reader to help them choose books from the library.

To support children on their journey to becoming fluent and enthusiastic readers, teachers use a range of assessment tools to monitor children’s progress so that they access books and texts that are appropriately matched to their stage of development. Reading teachers use what they hear and observe in the reading lessons as part of their ongoing, formative assessment, as well as more summative assessments, including half-termly Read, Write, Inc. assessments, Accelerated Reader Star reading tests, termly NFER reading assessments and past SATs reading papers for children in Years 2 and 6. Teachers adapt their teaching of phonics and reading for children who are identified as needing additional support, providing the necessary scaffolds to support children to access the reading curriculum at the appropriate level. Some children also receive one-to-one tuition and additional reading intervention provided by the Read, Write, Inc. programme.

Maths at Heathcoat Primary School

At Heathcoat Primary School we want all our children to develop a love of mathematics and to be able to solve a range of problems with confidence.

Following a comprehensive review of the teaching of mathematics, we have chosen to use the resources from the NCETM website (National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics) to help shape and deliver our maths curriculum. These resources are used across the whole school, including EYFS, to support teachers in delivering a comprehensive and cohesive maths curriculum. These resources ensured we could teach Maths in a mastery approach allowing all children to build on their learning throughout the year. The new format will allow us to focus more on the assessment of the children’s needs within each area so that lessons can be planned and adjusted accordingly. The aim is to ensure all pupils get a rounded and balanced curriculum targeting their learning needs and allowing children to build on key concepts during the year.

Pupils in Year 4 are required by the Government to sit a times tables test. This means that all children should know their multiplication facts to 12×12 by the end of year 4. To ensure that all children have the best opportunity to develop this knowledge we have introduced a daily times tables practice for all of KS2. This is a short focused session allowing the children to practice, learn and recall the multiplication and division facts.

We will continue to target arithmetic skills with weekly sessions and assessments as well as continuing to use My Maths, TT Rock stars and Numbots to support children’s learning at home.

Relationships and Sex Education

At Heathcoat Primary school, we follow the comprehensive PSHE programme called ‘Jigsaw’ This programme is a scheme of work that we teach from Nursery to year 6. Jigsaw covers all of the new national requirements for PSHE including the new relationships and health education that was required to be statutory from September 2020.

Jigsaw promotes the spiritual, moral, social, cultural, mental and physical development of all our pupils and prepares them for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of later life.

The documents below will help guide and reassure parents in regard to our RSE / PSHE obligations.

RSE Consult letter 8.3.23.docx

The Jigsaw approach to RSE

3-11 Snapshot Map Jigsaw PSHE

Jigsaw Information Leaflet for Parents and Carers

Jigsaw Information Leaflet for LGBT Parents

Our RSE policy can be found here. HPS PHSE Policy January 2023