Thematic inter-disciplinary planning & A Curriculum for Excellence

Western Isles February 2007: Workshop session

“Here is Edward Bear, coming downstairs now,

bump, bump,

bump on the back of his head, behind Christopher Robin.

It is, as far as he knows, the only way of coming downstairs,but sometimes he feels that there really is another way, if only he could stop bumping for a moment and think of it.”

Winnie The Pooh, A.A.Milne

ACfE Principles• Challenge & enjoyment

• Breadth

• Progression

• Depth

• Personalisation & Choice

• Coherence

• Relevance

Aims of the ACfE programme• Focus classroom practice upon the child and

around the 4 purposes of education :(successful learners; confident individuals; responsible citizenship; effective contributors)

• Simplify and prioritise the current curriculum• Encourage more learning through experiences• Create a single framework for the curriculum

and assessment

Proposals: looking at the curriculumdifferently

• Single framework 3-18• Promote learning across a wide range of contexts and

well planned experiences• More than curriculum areas and subjects, also

– Ethos and life of the school– Interdisciplinary projects and studies– Opportunities for personal achievement

• Equip young people with high level of literacy and numeracy skills, health & wellbeing, enterprising approaches, citizenship, skills for life & work

Cross-cutting ThemesA Curriculum for Excellence offers a way of

unifying the curriculum through themes such

as enterprise, citizenship, sustainable

development, health and creativity. Often

seen as add-ons, these can be built into the

curriculum framework.

“The curriculum areas should provide a basis for learning and the development of skills across a broad range of contexts. They offer opportunities for citizenship, sustainable development, enterprise, creativity and cultural aspects. …..

It will be open to schools to organise the outcomes and experiences differently (for example by designing challenging interdisciplinary projects), …to plan for progression, breadth and depth of learning.”

p15, Progress and Proposals 2006

Interdisciplinary projects and studies“The curriculum needs to include

space for learning beyond subject boundaries, so that

learners can make connections between

different areas of learning. …..To be successful, these activities need to be well

planned with a clear purpose and outcomes in mind.”

(Progress and Proposals 2006)

Making Choices in learning “The proposed changes to the structure of the curriculum

give us an opportunity to look differently at choices in learning at all stages. … We would like to work with schools to explore possibilities for different approaches to personalisation and choice. ..e.g., whether it would be desirable and possible for choices to take place over a more extended period across S1-S3, ….approaches to subject choice which are not based on the current modal structure ..”

p15-16, Progress and Proposals 2006

Learning Outcomes & Experiences• The work of commissioned writers

• Links to values, purposes & principles

• Links across curricular areas

• Links to cross-cutting themes

Around the Country• Citizenship conferences highlighted many examples of

excellent practice through workshop presentations (keep in touch through LTS Education for Citizenship website)

• Interdisciplinary topics in secondary (eg Trinity Academy, Edinburgh, Africa Week)

• Different Languages One Spirit and Roads to Equality (Shawlands Academy Global Citizenship)

• Responsible Travel (St Aiden’s HS Wishaw)-English Language module but with opportunities for geography, environmental and enterprise education

• Anderson High School, Lerwick

Nursery• Learning through Play from nursery into primary• Developing the potential of the outside play area

to develop understanding of the environment• Health promotion in the nursery (General consensus is that the nursery experience

promotes the V/P/Ps of ACfE anyway & it is how we can capitalise on this method of learning in primary & secondary that is important)

Collaborative Working• Opportunities for collaborative planning• Enhanced transitions result• Teaching methodologies reviewed• De-cluttering the curriculum through an

interdisciplinary project

Examples from WL Secondary Schools• Quality in Learning: integrating co-operative

learning, critical skills programme & AifL to develop the 4 capacities of ACfE across the curriculum

• Core skill development across the curriculum• Improving curricular choice (Skills for Work courses)• Developing confidence through drama approaches

across the curriculum• Values and S3 Boys (an experiment in Physics)

Recognition of Achievement• How do we recognise

broader skills and achievements more explicitly?

• Robust, convincing and highly valued

• Must not become a new bureaucratic burden for schools

Make time of opportunity for teachers and other educators to:• Shape the curriculum of the future

• Think and act creatively in their own setting

• Be part of the solution to the issues raised in the development of ACfE

Challenges• Management of change• Varying levels of awareness • Understanding of purposes and

principles• Readiness of staff to interpret and

use simplified guidance• Focus on literacy and numeracy• Cross-curricular issues• Staff focus on external accountability

and qualifications• Nature of CPD

A Curriculum for Excellence 2007