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At Stoke Minster, we believe that students deserve a Design & Technology curriculum which prepares them for the ever changing and technologically advanced world that they live in. Therefore, our curriculum aims to promote and develop resilient, independent, lifelong learners with the ability to solve problems utilising a range of transferrable skills enabling them to become successful and productive members of the wider community.
At Stoke Minster, we aim for our Design and Technology curriculum to be inspiring, creative and practical. Our approach to a high-quality, ambitious Design and Technology curriculum meets the requirements of the National Curriculum covering Cooking and Nutrition, Textiles and Technological knowledge. Opportunities are given for children to combine practical and technological skills with creative thinking to design and make products which meet human need, improve quality of life or solve an existing problem. Throughout the curriculum, children learn to use current technologies whilst also considering the impact of future technological developments. They also learn to think creatively and intervene to improve the quality of life, solving problems both as individuals and members of a team.
Design & Technology is a subject which draws, develops and implements a range of different disciplines including mathematics, science, engineering, computing, geography, business studies and art. The subject also embeds high quality English skills through analysis, evaluation and effective communication of ideas/innovation. At Stoke Minster, we believe that through developing our children in these areas we are preparing them for the world of work.
Stoke Minster is a diverse multi-cultural community with a large proportion of our children coming from disadvantaged backgrounds; our curriculum is designed to reflect this as each year group has the opportunity to study cooking and nutrition teaching our children how to cook healthily on a budget, they are also taught textiles including topics including ‘make do and mend’. Throughout the DT curriculum there are planned opportunities to enhance pupil’s cultural capital as we aim to reduce social inequalities and prepare our children for future educational success for example gardening club at the school’s allotment, forest school, cooking club etc.
In every unit of DT, our children transition through a rigorous cycle of research, design, make and evaluate often making prototypes which can be refined in the evaluation stage prior to creating the final product. Throughout each unit, focus is given to the ‘six-essential’ components including user, purpose, functionality, design decisions, innovation and authenticity. We recognise that parts of this cycle may be repeated several times before an end product is created that the children are pleased with and that solves the initial problem.
Children are given opportunities to reflect upon and evaluate past and present design technology, its uses and its effectiveness and are encouraged to become innovators. This evaluation stage encourages our children to become self-regulated learners through identifying where designs could be improved.
Long Term Plan
The skills that the children learn are to design, make and evaluate within the skills of cooking and nutrition and technological knowledge. All of our skills and knowledge are broken down into progressive steps.
Our units follow a distinct sequence, which is built around evaluation of the product against intended use.
A typical unit plan
Our Design and Technology curriculum at Stoke Minster incorporates some substantive values including innovation, sustainability, decision making and evaluation – these are linked closely to our school values as we believe that developing the children’s understanding of these concept will deepen their understanding of how design and technology impacts the world around them.
