St Peter's CE Primary School
Our Curriculum at St Peter's
At St Peter’s CE Primary School, our curriculum is at the heart of everything we do. Guided by our school vision, ‘Love Others, Value Everyone’, we are committed to providing an ambitious, inclusive and inspiring education that enables every child to flourish academically, socially, emotionally and spiritually.
Our curriculum is carefully designed around three key principles: Intent, Implementation and Impact. Together, these explain what we want our children to learn, how we deliver that learning and the difference it makes to their knowledge, skills, experiences and future opportunities.
Through a coherently planned and carefully sequenced curriculum, we build strong foundations, nurture curiosity and broaden our children’s horizons. We recognise the individuality of our pupils and the rich diversity of our school community, ensuring that learning is accessible, challenging and meaningful for all. By combining high-quality teaching with memorable experiences and meaningful connections across subjects, we aim to develop confident, independent and enthusiastic learners who understand the world around them and their place within it.
The information below outlines the principles that underpin our curriculum, the approaches we use to bring learning to life and how we evaluate its effectiveness. Above all, it reflects our commitment to ensuring that every child is valued, every learner is supported to achieve their potential and all pupils leave St Peter’s equipped with the knowledge, skills and values to embrace the next stage of their education and make a positive contribution to society.
Curriculum Intent
At St Peter’s CE Primary School, our curriculum is stimulating, ambitious and knowledge-rich. It is designed to broaden our children’s horizons, develop their natural inquisitiveness, inspire a joy of discovery and help them make meaningful connections between different areas of learning. Rooted in our school vision, ‘Love Others, Value Everyone’, our curriculum aims to develop well-rounded, confident and responsible individuals who demonstrate kindness, respect and compassion, work cooperatively with others, think independently and approach new challenges with creativity and curiosity.
Our curriculum is coherently planned and carefully sequenced to build children’s knowledge, skills and understanding over time. Each subject has a clear progression of key knowledge and skills, with learning carefully mapped across year groups to ensure that children revisit, practise and build upon what they have previously learnt. This enables children to develop secure foundations before moving on to more complex concepts and ideas. Our planning takes account of the needs of our children at St Peter’s, recognising their starting points, experiences and individual barriers to learning. We aim to provide appropriate support and challenge so that all children, including those with SEND and those who need additional help to secure essential knowledge, can access an ambitious curriculum and achieve well.
We recognise the importance of both subject-specific learning and meaningful connections across the curriculum. Some subjects, including mathematics and phonics, are taught through carefully structured, discrete lessons to ensure that essential knowledge and skills are taught systematically and progressively. Other subjects are taught through a combination of standalone lessons and carefully planned links to wider topics. Where these connections strengthen learning, we bring subjects together through shared themes, high-quality spine texts, and links to history and geography. These texts and topics provide a meaningful context for learning, develop vocabulary and language, stimulate discussion and writing, and help children explore ideas from different perspectives. However, we ensure that these links do not compromise the integrity of individual subjects: each subject retains its own curriculum objectives, key knowledge, disciplinary skills and progression.
History and geography often provide a central context for exploring a topic, helping children to develop a secure understanding of people, places, events and the wider world. Carefully selected spine texts can enrich these experiences, providing opportunities to explore significant individuals, different cultures, historical periods and geographical environments in greater depth. Through this approach, children are supported to make connections between subjects while developing the distinct knowledge and skills required in each discipline.
Our curriculum reflects the local context of Harborne and the diverse, culturally rich community of Birmingham, while broadening children’s understanding of the wider world. We want our pupils to appreciate different cultures, beliefs, experiences and perspectives, and to understand their place within their local community and beyond. Learning is enriched through visits, visitors, practical activities and memorable experiences beyond the classroom. These opportunities bring learning to life, deepen understanding, build cultural capital and help children connect their classroom learning to real-world experiences.
We are committed to providing a broad and balanced curriculum throughout the school, ensuring that children experience the full range of subjects and develop a wide range of interests, talents and aspirations. As children move through the school, learning builds progressively towards the knowledge, skills and independence they need for the next stage of their education. In Year 6, we carefully balance preparation for statutory assessments with the importance of maintaining a rich, engaging and varied curriculum. We want our children to leave St Peter’s with secure academic foundations, a genuine enthusiasm for learning and the confidence, knowledge and values to embrace future opportunities.
Ultimately, our curriculum is designed not only to prepare children academically, but also to nurture their social, emotional and spiritual development. Through ambitious teaching, carefully sequenced learning and experiences that encourage curiosity, reflection and connection, we aim to ensure that every child feels valued, develops their potential and is equipped to make a positive contribution to the world around them.
Curriculum Implementation
At St Peter’s CE Primary School, our curriculum is brought to life through enthusiastic, knowledgeable teaching that inspires children to develop a love of learning. Teachers have a secure understanding of the subjects they teach, the key knowledge pupils need to acquire and the intended end points for each year group and key stage. This ensures that learning is purposeful, builds progressively over time and enables children to develop the knowledge, skills and understanding they need to succeed.
Lessons are carefully structured to support learning and help children make meaningful progress. Teachers revisit prior learning through regular retrieval practice, helping pupils to strengthen their recall and make connections with new knowledge. New learning is broken down into manageable steps, with teachers explaining concepts clearly, modelling new skills and providing opportunities for guided practice before children apply their learning more independently. Throughout lessons, teachers check pupils’ understanding, address misconceptions and provide opportunities for children to reflect on what they have learned and identify their next steps. This approach supports children in building secure knowledge in their long-term memory.
Adaptive teaching is central to our approach. Teachers recognise that children learn at different rates and may require different levels of support or challenge to access the same ambitious curriculum. Through careful questioning, observation, assessment and ongoing checks for understanding, teachers identify pupils’ needs and adapt their teaching accordingly. This may include providing additional modelling, breaking learning into smaller steps, revisiting prior knowledge, using visual prompts or practical resources, pre-teaching vocabulary, offering scaffolds or providing additional guided practice. Where pupils demonstrate secure understanding, teachers extend their thinking through deeper questioning, more complex tasks and opportunities to apply knowledge in unfamiliar contexts. Adaptations are responsive to pupils’ needs and are designed to remove barriers to learning while maintaining high expectations for all.
Our lesson structure ensures that learning has a clear purpose and direction. Teachers make explicit what pupils are learning, why it is important and how it connects to previous learning and the wider curriculum. New knowledge is introduced systematically, with opportunities for teachers to model, explain and check understanding before pupils practice and apply what they have learned. Regular assessment throughout the lesson informs teachers’ decisions about whether to move forward, provide further explanation or revisit a concept. This responsive approach ensures that pupils are supported to secure essential knowledge before progressing to more challenging learning.
Teachers use the key knowledge identified within each subject to ensure that pupils remember the most important concepts, vocabulary, facts and skills. They understand the intended learning outcomes and end points for their year group and key stage, using these to inform lesson planning, teaching and assessment. While the curriculum provides a clear and coherent sequence, teachers are confident in adapting their plans when assessment shows that pupils need additional time, practice or explanation, or when they are ready to move on more quickly. This ensures that teaching responds to pupils’ understanding rather than simply following a predetermined timetable.
We place great importance on developing children’s vocabulary, communication and independence. Pupils are encouraged to ask questions, explain their thinking, articulate their understanding and learn from the ideas of others. Through purposeful discussion, partner work, collaborative activities and opportunities to justify their answers, children develop confidence in expressing themselves and deepen their understanding. Teachers make meaningful connections across subjects where these strengthen learning, helping pupils understand the relevance of what they are learning and how knowledge can be applied in different contexts.
Our approach to implementation is underpinned by high expectations, strong relationships and a commitment to ensuring that every child can participate in learning. Teachers use their knowledge of pupils’ starting points, individual needs and prior attainment to plan effective support and challenge. Teaching assistants and additional resources are deployed purposefully to support access to the curriculum and promote increasing independence. For pupils with SEND or those who experience barriers to learning, adaptations are informed by an understanding of their individual needs and the strategies that help them learn successfully.
Through consistent, evidence-informed teaching approaches, responsive assessment and effective adaptive teaching, we aim to ensure that all pupils at St Peter’s develop secure foundations, retain important knowledge and become confident, curious and independent learners who are well prepared for the next stage of their education.
Curriculum Impact
At St Peter’s CE Primary School, we want all children to achieve well, develop secure foundations for future learning and leave us equipped with the knowledge, skills and personal qualities they need to succeed in the next stage of their education. The impact of our curriculum is reflected in what children know, remember and can do, the quality of their work across the curriculum and their ability to apply their learning with increasing confidence and independence.
All staff have high expectations of every child, and we are committed to ensuring that all pupils, regardless of their starting points or individual needs, have the opportunity to achieve their potential. Children’s work across the curriculum reflects these expectations, with teachers focusing on the development of subject knowledge, key skills, vocabulary and the ability to apply learning in different contexts. We want our pupils to develop a genuine enthusiasm for learning, ask thoughtful questions, make connections between ideas and demonstrate increasing independence as they progress through the school.
Historically, St Peter’s has been proud of its end-of-key-stage outcomes, which have been above national averages in most cases. We recognise the importance of these outcomes as one measure of the effectiveness of our curriculum, alongside the progress pupils make from their individual starting points and the quality of learning over time. We use assessment information to evaluate how successfully our curriculum is meeting pupils’ needs and to identify where further support or improvement may be required.
We use Insight Tracker to monitor pupils’ attainment and progress across the curriculum in every year group. Teachers draw on assessment information, pupils’ work, observations and ongoing checks for understanding to build a picture of what children know, understand and can do. This enables us to identify strengths, recognise gaps in knowledge and ensure that important learning is being secured. Assessment is used purposefully to inform teaching and curriculum development, rather than simply to generate data.
Termly pupil progress meetings provide a structured opportunity for teachers and school leaders to review the progress of all pupils, with a particular focus on children who are not making the expected progress or who are at risk of falling behind. These meetings explore the barriers that may be affecting learning and identify appropriate strategies to address them. Teachers and leaders agree targeted actions, which may include adapting classroom teaching, revisiting essential knowledge, providing additional practice, deploying support staff effectively or implementing focused interventions. Progress is then reviewed to evaluate the impact of these actions and determine whether further adjustments are needed.
We recognise that effective interventions must complement, rather than replace, high-quality classroom teaching. Our priority is to ensure that pupils develop secure foundations in essential areas of learning and can access the full curriculum with increasing confidence. Through responsive teaching, appropriate support and carefully monitored interventions, we aim to prevent gaps in knowledge from widening and help pupils catch up where necessary.
The impact of our curriculum is also evident in pupils’ wider development. We want children to leave St Peter’s as confident communicators, curious thinkers and responsible individuals who demonstrate our school vision, ‘Love Others, Value Everyone!’ We seek to nurture children who show kindness, respect and compassion, value differences, work collaboratively and contribute positively to their community. Their experiences across the curriculum should broaden their horizons, develop their interests and aspirations, and prepare them to engage thoughtfully with the world around them.
Ultimately, we evaluate the success of our curriculum through a combination of assessment outcomes, pupils’ progress, the quality of their work, discussions with pupils and staff, and ongoing monitoring of teaching and learning. This enables us to celebrate what is working well, identify areas for development and continually refine our provision. Our ambition is that every child leaves St Peter’s with secure academic foundations, a love of learning and the knowledge, skills and values to flourish in the next stage of their education and beyond.
Please refer to the subject links below for information about how each subject is delivered.