Helen, the Heart Nurse, came to visit each year group.  Helen works in our local community, caring for patients who have problems with their heart.  She talked to us about the structure of the heart, how blood circulates around our body and how she measure the healthiness of a heart.   We explored the model of the heart and measured our pulses!  The children were very curious indeed and asked some intriguing questions.

Intent

At Croftlands Junior School, we want our children to become enthusiastic and skilled scientists, who use their practical skills, knowledge, understand and natural curiosity to question, explore and discover the world around them.  We want our children to leave Year 6 as curious, resilient individuals, able to learn from explorations that did not succeed yet able to adapt and be flexible and try again.  Our young scientists will be able to recognise and manage risk appropriately, working together respectfully to find out more.

The school has built links with local employers and Higher Education establishments, including Siemens, Lancaster University and UlverSTEM, a local organisation of local businesses.   We are thrilled to have been awared the Primary Science Quality Mark. 

283 Primary Science Quality Marks have been awarded to infant, junior, primary, middle and special schools to celebrate their commitment to excellence in science teaching and learning.  So far, since its national launch in 2010, over 4000 schools across the UK have achieved a prestigious Primary Science Quality Mark.  

The Primary School Quality Mark programme ensures effective leadership of science, enables schools to work together to share good practice and is supported by professional development led by local experts. It encourages teacher autonomy and innovation while at the same time offering a clear framework for development in science subject leadership, teaching and learning. Schools that achieve PSQM demonstrate commitment and expertise in science leadership, teaching and learning.

Implementation

We use and adapt the United Learning Curriculum, which is built upon the National Curriculum, to deliver a series of units with opportunities to introduce and revisit key concepts. This approach enables pupils to deepen understanding and embed learning.

Throughout the programmes of study, the children acquire and develop substantive and disciplinary knowledge that has been identified within each unit and builds progressively throughout. Working Scientifically skills are sequenced so that they are explicitly taught and practiced alongside the substantive knowledge, which is regularly reviewed and built upon across the years. Our curriculum is designed to ensure that children are able to acquire key scientific knowledge through practical experiences and develop the skills required to allow them to use equipment confidently, conduct experiments with aptitude and explain scientific concepts confidently.

Teachers create a positive attitude to science learning within their classrooms and reinforce an expectation that all pupils are capable of achieving high standards in science. This is assured by the following approaches:

• Content is carefully situated within existing schemas. Every unit considers the prior knowledge that is prerequisite for that unit and builds on that knowledge to develop a deeper understanding.

• Children are introduced to each unit with knowledge organisers, which focus on key concepts and vocabulary, these are then used to support student learning throughout the topic. Children also start the unit with a pre-learning quiz to asses prior learning, the results then inform future planning. Working walls are added to as the unit progresses, supporting children in retrieving information and promoting student independence.
• Vertical concepts are used within lessons to connect aspects of learning.
• Disciplinary knowledge is explicitly taught to pupils and carefully sequenced to ensure pupils are provided with opportunities to practice these skills and use vocabulary throughout the curriculum. 
• Opportunities for extended, scholarly writing appear throughout the curriculum. These have a clear purpose and audience and, crucially, allow pupils to write as a scientist.
• Cross-curricular links are planned to ensure deep learning and to encourage the children to understand the connections between the world around them and other disciplines.
• We provide extra-curricular activities to enrich and inspire. Clubs such as STEM club and school trips to BAE and Furness STEM show, allow children to explore scientific concepts further, speak to experts and apply their learning into real life contexts. We have also previously had science shows brought into school as well as visits from local engineers to support us in our Primary Engineer projects. Children learn about the possibilities for careers in science, as a result of our community links. They learn from and work with professionals, ensuring access to positive role models within the field of science from the immediate and wider local community.
• Working Scientifically skills are embedded into lessons to ensure that skills are systematically developed throughout the children’s school journey and new vocabulary and challenging concepts are introduced through direct teaching.

Impact

The careful sequencing of the curriculum – and how concepts are gradually built over time – is the progression model. If pupils are keeping up with the curriculum, they are making progress. Formative assessment is prioritised and is focused on whether pupils are keeping up with the curriculum.

In general, this is done through:

• Opportunities for formative assessment during lessons, and teachers continually adapt their lesson delivery to address misconceptions and fill any gaps in knowledge.
• Talking to pupils about their books allowing the Subject Leader to assess how much of the curriculum content is secure, including substantive and disciplinary knowledge. These conversations are used to determine whether pupils have a good understanding of the vertical concepts, and if they can link recently taught content to learning from previous units.
• Pre-learning quizzes at the start of each unit. These assess pupils’ understanding of the prior knowledge that is required to access the new content in the unit. These are used to identify gaps to be filled prior to teaching the new unit.
• A summative post-learning quiz is provided for every unit which aim to assess whether pupils have learned the core knowledge for that unit. These are also used formatively, to fill gaps and address misconceptions before moving on. Lesson outcomes and written explanations are also used to aid teacher assessment.

By the end of Key Stage Two, all children will have developed scientific enquiry skills in the eight key areas: exploring, questioning, predicting, gathering evidence, recording, presenting, explaining and evaluating. We want our children to be inspired to learn further at secondary school and form the foundations of interest in careers in the scientific field. All children should feel they are capable of being scientists.