Curriculum

Curriculum Intent

At Our Lady Mother of the Saviour, we have a curriculum that places Gospel Values at the centre of everything we do. Our curriculum is designed to develop the full potential of each child and prepare them for the opportunities, responsibilities and experiences of adult life. We aim to broaden the range of everyday experiences for our children, thereby widening their horizons and enriching our community.

Knowledge intertwined with skills underpins our curriculum design; we believe that knowledge enables our children to develop and apply skills. We want our children to be critical thinkers, problem solvers and to have an informed understanding of local, national and global issues. Our curriculum design ensures there is a clear progression of knowledge in each subject across all year groups. What we want children to know is carefully mapped out in our curriculum grids. We believe it is important to provide our children with well-connected knowledge, as it is the connections between facts that foster understanding and lead to the development of crucial skills such as problem-solving and. Cross-curricular links are made when opportunities naturally arise, helping children to connect the knowledge and skills they have acquired.

Intelligent repetition of content is built into our curriculum, as we recognise that children need to retrieve core knowledge quickly if they are to use it effectively. Therefore, our curriculum incorporates opportunities for repetition and practice, which help to develop children’s procedural memory. Knowledge and skills are assessed both formally and informally and this information is used to inform future planning.

Personal Development   

At Our Lady Mother of the Saviour, we recognise that emotions and intellect are not contradictory – both are needed to be successful. As such, we operate an emotional intelligence curriculum for all our children. This curriculum focuses on developing key areas: managing feelings, self-esteem, self-awareness and consequences, resilience, communication and empathy. It is delivered through assemblies, the PSHE curriculum and focus weeks in all classes. All children are taught specific strategies to help them manage their emotions.

Supporting our children’s mental health and developing emotional intelligence is something we invest much time and energy in at Our Lady’s – it is a crucial part of our ethos, vision and values as a school family. We aim to educate our children to be emotionally literate and morally responsible.

Learning in a Wide Range of Contexts

• Learning outside the classroom is an integral part of our curriculum. This takes place through exploring the local environment, visiting places of interest and enjoying residential activities.

• We have developed an enriched outdoor learning environment within our school grounds.

• We deliver a wide range of extracurricular activities such as sports, art, gardening, cookery and music. These activities underpin and enrich the curriculum, and the school has strengthened opportunities for our children by becoming part of the Children’s University.

• Sports funding is well planned and targeted to develop teaching skills, promote a healthy lifestyle and enable pupils to participate in competitive sports.

Further details about our curriculum can be gained by contacting the headteacher Mrs M Kewn

01928711921

head.olms@halton.gov.uk